D  921  .G7  1910 
Good,  James  I.  1850-1924 
Famous  places  of  the 
Reformed  Churches 


Nv£XANo* 


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IB  21  1951 


Famous  Places  o 
Reformed  Churches 


A  Religious  Guidebook  to  Europe 


BY  2X 

REV.  PROF.  JAMES  I.  GOOD,  D.D. 

Professor  of  Reformed  Church  History  in  the  Central  Theological  Seminary 

of  the  Reformed  Church  in  the  U.  S.,  Author  of "  Famous  Women 

of  the  Reformed  Church,"  ''Famous  Missionaries  of  the 

Reformed  Church;1  "Origin  of  the  Reformed 

Church  in  Germany,"   "History  of 

the  Reformed  Church  in 

Germany;'  etc. 


Together  with  a  Chapter  by 
REV.  MARCUS  A.  BROWNSON,  D.D. 


H  EIDELBERG      PRESS 

PHILADELPHIA 

1910 


FOREWORD 

There  is  no  department  of  human  knowledge 
more  interesting  than  history,  and  none  which  right- 
ly used  is  more  conducive  to  mental  and  moral  de- 
velopment. History  properly  written  brings  the 
mind  into  helpful  contact  with  past  generations  by 
the  narration  of  their  achievements,  quickens  the 
imagination  by  the  touch  of  pure  and  high  senti- 
ment, appeals  to  the  heroic  element  of  human  na- 
ture by  the  stimulus  of  the  romantic,  exhibits  the 
unity  of  the  human  race  alike  in  its  fears  and  hopes, 
and  reveals  God  upon  His  throne,  overuling  the 
evil  for  good,  causing  the  wrath  of  man  to  praise 
Him.  and  compelling  all  things  to  work  together 
for  good  for  the  true  welfare  of  the  world. 

Among  historians  some  have  the  gift  of  popular 
presentation  of  the  subjects  they  describe.  They 
know  what  interests  the  people,  and  how  to  interest 
them.  American  Christians  holding  to  the  Reform- 
ed Faith  and  the  Presbyterian  Polity,  are  to  be 
congratulated  that  Prof.  James  I.  Good  has  added 
this  volume,  "Famous  Places  of  the  Reformed 
Churches,"  to  his  other  popular  historical  works. 
Possessed  of  a   facile  pen,   easily  a  master  in  the 

3 


4  Foreword. 

history  of  the  Reformed  Churches  on  both  sides  of 
the  Atlantic,  no  one  of  his  productions  will  be  more 
generally  acceptable.  The  work  not  only  supplies 
an  acknowledged  vacant  place  in  the  bibliography 
of  church  history,  but  also  presents  in  an  attractive 
and  popular  form,  the  record  of  men  and  places  of 
decided  interest  to  lovers  of  human  progress,  and 
of  great  value  to  loyal  Christians  of  every  name. 

Wm.  Hexry  Roberts. 


PREFACE 

Europe  is  the  birthplace  of  all  the  Reformed 
churches,  holding  the  Presbyterian  system,  whether 
they  go  back  to  Zwingli,  Calvin  or  Knox.  We 
have,  therefore,  asked  Rev.  William  H.  Roberts, 
D.D.,  LL.D.,  American  Secretary  of  the  Reformed 
and  Presbyterian  Alliance,  to  speak  the  fore-word 
for  this  book. 

This  volume  aims  to  show  that  the  various  Cal- 
vinistic  churches  have  many  sacred  places,  which 
are  full  of  historic  interest.  These  should  be 
known  by  the  members  of  our  churches  to  stimu- 
late proper  denominational  pride  and  also  to  pro- 
duce a  healthy  denominational  consciousness.  The 
author,  by  his  studies  in  church  history  and  fre- 
quent visits  to  Europe,  has  spent  many  years  in 
gathering  the  materials  for  this  work.  It  is,  how- 
ever, to  be  remembered  by  the  reader,  that  the  book 
gives  but  an  outline,  and  is  not  intended  to  be  ex- 
haustive. He  has  also  arranged  it,  so  that  it  may 
serve  as  a  religious  guidebook  to  Europe  for  those 
who  visit  that  continent,  as  it  gives  as  far  as  pos- 

5 


6  Preface. 

sible  the  exact  locality  of  these  sacred  places.  The 
popular  guidebooks,  as  Baedeker,  either  ignore  the 
Protestant  places,  or,  if  they  notice  them,  give  but 
a  very  brief  notice.  To  the  traveller,  history  is  a 
wonderful  stimulus.  There  is  nothing  like  reading 
the  story,  right  at  the  place  where  it  occurred. 

The  author  desires  to  express  his  gratitude  to 
Rev.  Mr.  Szabo,  of  Buda-Pesth,  Rev.  Mr.  Soucek, 
of  Prague,  Rev.  C.  Merle  D'Aubigne,  of  Paris,  and 
Rev.  E.  T.  Corwin,  D.D.,  of  this  country,  for  in- 
formation given,  as  well  as  to  Rev.  Marcus  A. 
Brownson,  D.D.,  and  Rev.  William  H.  Roberts, 
D.D.,  LL.D.,  for  their  contributions.  He  also  re- 
grets that  the  proof  will  have  to  be  read  by  another 
after  his  departure  for  Europe.  But  he  desires  to 
express  gratefulness  to  Rev.  Lloyd  M.  Knoll  for 
reading  the  proof  in  his  absence.  He  will  add  one 
or  two  more  appendices  to  the  work,  one  on  Er- 
rata and  another  on  New  Sacred  Places  which  he 
may  find  in  his  travels  and  researches.  Praying 
that  this  work  may  have  an  educational  and  inspi- 
rational influence  on  the  members  of  our  churches 
wherever  found  he  leaves  the  book  to  his  readers. 


CONTENTS. 

BOOK   I— SWITZERLAND. 

Chapter     I.     Zurich   and   Zwingli-land,    n 

Chapter     2.  Zurich,    the    Original    Church   of    the    Re- 
formed    27 

Chapter     3.     Zurich  since  Zwingli's  Time 37 

Chapter     4.     Basle  and  its  Beautiful  Cathedral 55 

Chapter     5.     Bern,   the   Capitol   of   Switzerland 69 

Chapter     6.     The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine,   79 

Chapter     7.     Neuchatel  and  Farel,    97 

Chapter     8.     Geneva,  Calvin's   Model  City 109 

Chapter    9.     Geneva,   since  Calvin's   Time,    123 

Chapter  10.     Lausanne  and  Canton  Vaud,   139 

BOOK  II— GERMANY. 

Chapter  1.     Strashurg  and  its   Majestic  Cathedral,    ...151 

Chapter  2.     Heidelberg  and  its  Reformation,   165 

Chapter  3.     Heidelberg  and  its  Ruined   Castle,    185 

Chapter  4.     The   Beautiful  Rhineland  and  the  Cologne 

Cathedral 205 

Chapter  5.     Northern  Germany  and  Berlin 233 

BOOK  III— OTHER  EUROPEAN  COUNTRIES. 


Chapter  1 
Chapter  2 
Chapter  3 
Chapter  4 
Chapter  5 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots 255 

France  and  the  Huguenots,   279 

Italy  and  the  Waldenses,  311 

Brave  Little  Holland,  323 

Hungary.   Picturesque  Buda-Pesth  and  the 
Blue  Danube 365 


8  Contents. 

Chapter  6.     Bohemia,  Huss  and  Prague,   383 

Chapter  7.     England,  Wales  and  Ireland,   403 

Chapter     8.     Edinburgh.      By   Rev.   Marcus   A.   Brown- 
son,    D.D.,     423 

Appendix      I.     The    Diaspora    or    Scattered    Churches 

of  our  Faith,  449 

Appendix  II.  Reformed  and  Presbyterian  Services  on 
the  Continent  of  Europe  in  the  Eng- 
lish language,    453 


ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Heidelberg,    at    present,    Frontispiece 

Einsedeln,     J9 

Zurich,    26 

Basle,   54 

Bern,    & 

Neuchatel,   96 

Geneva,     Io8 

Lausanne J3° 

Strasburg   Cathedral, 15° 

Cologne    Cathedral,     204 

The  Great  Elector  of  Brandenburg  and  his  wife  Louisa 

Henrietta,    232 

Church  of  St.  Germain  1'  Auxerrois,   254 

Huguenot  Worship   in  the   woods,    278 

The  Balsille  in  the  Italian  Valleys 310 

The  Tomb  of  Prince  William  of  Orange,  332 

Buda  Pesth,  364 

Prague ■ • ■ 3°2 

The  House  of  Knox  at  Edinburgh,   422 


BOOK  I.— SWITZERLAND 

Chapter  I.— ZURICH  AND  ZWINGLI-LAND. 

THE  famous  places  of  the  Reformed 
Churches  !  \\ "here  shall  we  begin — there 
are  so  many  of  them,  where,  but  at  Zu- 
rich, the  mother  of  them  all?  Zurich  was  the  birth- 
place of  all  the  Reformed  and  Presbyterian  Churches. 
The  city  of  Zurich  is  finely  located  at  the  western 
end  of  the  picturesque  lake  of  Zurich,  at  whose 
eastern  end  the  snow-capped  Alps  can  be  clearly 
seen.  The  city  is  divided  by  the  swift  river  Lim- 
mat.  which,  carrying  off  the  water  of  lake  Zurich, 
flows  westward  through  the  city.  To  the  south  of 
the  city,  is  a  range  of  hills,  the  highest  of  which, 
the  Utliberg,  rises  1,500  feet  above  the  city,  com- 
manding a  fine  view.  To  the  north  of  the  city  the 
hills  ascend  more  gradually.  It  has  at  present  a 
population  of  about  175,000,  and  is  the  largest  city 
of  Switzerland.  It  is  also  the  greatest  industrial 
centre  of  that  land.  Zurich  owes  its  present  pros- 
perity to  the  reformation ;  for  the  Italian  silk- 
weavers,  who  were  driven  out  of  Chiavenna  on  the 

11 


12       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

northwestern  coast  of  lake  Maggiore,  Italy,  in  1555, 
because  they  were  Protestants,  found  an  asylum  in 
Zurich  and  now  Zurich  is  famous  for  its  silk  and 
cotton  factories. 

But  Zurich  is  especially  interesting  to  the  Chris- 
tian because  of  her  splendid  religious  history  in 
the  reformation  and  since.  Looking  eastward  from 
Zurich,  over  the  lake,  one  can  see  just  north  of 
the  eastern  end  of  the  lake,  the  tall  peak  of  Mount 
Sentis,  the  highest  of  the  northern  group  of  the 
Alps,  about  8,000  feet  high.  On  its  southern  slope, 
in  an  upper  valley  about  4,000  feet  above  sea-level, 
there  is  a  village  called  Wildhaus,  where  to-day 
can  be  found  a  small  one-story  Swiss  chalet.  In 
that  house,  was  born  on  New  Year's  day,  1484,  a 
babe  who  was  destined  to  revolutionize  his  native 
land,  and  be  the  founder  of  the  Reformed  Churches 
throughout  the  world,  Ulric  Zwingli.*  Not 
far  from  the  chalet  is  the  little  country  church  in 
which  he  was  baptized,  with  its  bare  benches  and 
its  only  furniture,  a  pulpit  and  a  font.  But  on  the 
little  gallery  opposite  the  pulpit  are  the  words  of 
a  German  hvmn — 


*This  house  is  still  kept  in  a  good  state  of  preserva- 
tion by  a  Swiss  society,  formed  for  the  purpose. 


Zurich  and  Zwingli-land.  13 

"Hold  fast  on  God's  Word! 
It   is  your   happiness   on    earth: 
And  as  sure  as  there  is  a  God 
Your  happiness  also  in   heaven." 

His  father,  who  was  the  magistrate  of  the  village, 
trained  his  early  boyhood  and  his  mother  taught 
him  Bible  stories.  "I  have  often  thought,"  said 
one  of  his  friends  later,  "that  on  those  Alpine 
heights  so  near  to  heaven,  he  must  have  imbibed 
something  heavenly  and  divine."  His  father  seeing 
that  he  was  too  bright  a  boy  to  become  merely  a 
shepherd  boy,  like  his  fellows,  sent  him  away  to 
school.  At  the  early  age  of  eight  he  went  down  to 
the  valley  south  of  his  birthplace,  where  his  uncle 
was  priest  at  the  little  village  of  Wesen,  located  at 
the  western  end  of  that  small  but  exceedingly  grand 
lake  of  Wallenstadt.*  In  two  years,  he  had 
learned  all  that  was  to  be  taught  in  that  school, 
so  at  the  age  of  ten  he  was  sent  far  away  among 
strangers  to  Basle,  in  the  northwestern  corner  of 
Switzerland.    There  he  studied  for  three  years  and 


*This  lake  is  located  just  east  of  lake  Zurich,  where 
the  seven  mountains,  the  Churfursten,  rise  6.000  feet 
right  up  from  the  northern  side  of  the  lake. 


14      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

first  began  to  reveal  his  unusual  abilities,  especially 
in  oratory  and  music.  Then  he  was  sent  to  a  more 
advanced  school  at  Bern,  where  the  new  method  of 
education  called  Humanism  was  taught  by  Lupulus.* 
Then  because  the  Dominicans  wanted  to  make  him 
a  monk,  his  father  recalled  him  and  sent  him  to  the 
University  of  Vienna,  where  he  was  educated,  not 
in  the  newer  methods  of  Humanism,  but  after  the 
old  methods.  He,  however,  completed  his  course 
in  the  university  too  soon  to  be  old  enough  to  enter 
the  priesthood.  So  he  went  back  to  Basle  to  spend 
a  year  in  study.  This  was  his  crucial  year.  There 
he  met  and  studied  under  Thomas  Wyttenbach, 
who  prepared  him  to  become  the  great  reformer  he 
afterwards  was. 

East  of  Zurich,  and  just  south  of  the  eastern  end 
of  lake  Zurich  is  a  narrow  valley,  leading  south- 
ward and  overlooked  at  its  southern  end  by  the 
stately  Toedi,  the  most  beautiful  of  the  northern 
Alps.  In  this  narrow  valley,  is  the  town  of  Glarus, 
closely  encircled  by  mountains  rising  from  4,000  to 
6.000  feet  above  it.    This  was  the  first  charge  of  the 


*We    shall    refer   to    his    stay   at    Basle   and    Bern    in 
the  later  chapters  on  those  cities. 


Zurich  and  Zzvingli-laiid.  15 

young  priest  Zwingli,  where  he  spent  ten  years 
(1506-1516).  As  yet  he  was  not  a  reformer,  but 
there  are  several  significant  signs  in  his  life  pointing 
that  way. 

1.  He  went  twice  to  Italy  as  chaplain,  and  in 
those  trips  learned  of  the  great  wickedness  of  Cath- 
olicism ;  for  the  proverb  then  was  "the  nearer 
Rome,  the  nearer  hell."  On  one  of  these  trips  he 
preached  to  the  Swiss  soldiers  at  Monza  exhorting 
them  to  bravery. 

2.  While  on  these  trips  he  happened  to  visit 
Milan  and  there  discovered  that  not  all  the  liturgies 
of  the  Catholic  Church  were  alike,  for  the  liturgy 
of  Milan  was  different  from  the  other  Catholic 
liturgies. 

3.  At  Mollis,  located  just  north  of  Glarus,  he 
happened  to  discover  a  liturgy  a  century  or  more 
old,  which  stated  that  at  the  Lord's  Supper,  the 
priest  gave  the  wine  as  well  as  the  wafer  to  the 
communicant.  This  was  different  from  the  usual 
Catholic  custom,  where  the  priest  does  not  give  the 
wine  to  the  communicant,  but  drinks  it  himself. 

4.  He  strongly  opposed  the  enlistment  of  the 
Swiss  in  the  armies  of  other  nations,  because  when 

.  they   came   home   they   corrupted   the   people.      As 


i6       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches: 

the  pope  was  one  of  the  foreign  powers  who  tempt- 
ed the  Swiss  into  his  armies,  Zwingli  was  thus  led 
to  take  sides  against  the  pope  in  secular  matters,  al- 
though still  submissive  to  him  in  spiritual  things. 

5.  Prof.  Egli,  of  Zurich,  the  publisher  of  Zwing- 
li's  works,  notes  another  sign  toward  the  reforma- 
tion. He  says  that  Zwingli  from  15 12  was  zealous 
in  the  study  of  Greek.  This  led  him  to  compare  the 
Catholic  doctrines  with  the  parts  of  the  New  Tes- 
tament that  were  in  his  possession.  Zwingli  de- 
clared at  that  time  that  he  found  nothing  in  the 
Bible  that  taught  the  doctrine  of  the  intercession 
of  the  saints.  "Christ"  he  says  "is  the  only  treas- 
ure of  our  souls."  But  this  doctrine  of  the  inter- 
cession of  the  saints  was  one  of  the  cornerstones 
of  the  papacy. 

These  events  began  to  prepare  him  for  his  ulti- 
mate breach  with  Rome.  At  Glarus  the  church  in 
which  he  ministered  and  which  had  a  chapel  named 
after  him,  the  Zwingli-chapel,  was  burned  down  in 
a  great  conflagration  in  1861.  A  new  church  has 
since  been  built,  which  has  the  remarkable  peculiar- 
ity that  in  it  both  Catholics  and  Protestants  wor- 
ship in  the  same  room,  though  at  different  hours. 
At  the  end  of  the  church,  is  the  Catholic  high  altar 


Zurich  and  Zwingli-land.  17 

with  its  candles  and  its  crosses,  and  a  short  distance 
ahead  of  it,  but  on  the  side,  is  the  Protestant  pul- 
pit. We  doubt  whether  Zwingli,  were  he  living  to- 
day, would  have  favored  any  such  compromise  with 
Rome.  But  the  hostility  between  the  two  religions 
has  passed  away  at  Glarus,  and  the  parish  thought 
it  was  more  economical,  to  build  one  church  than  to 
build  two.  Another  reason  for  it  was  the  ration- 
alism that  had  entered  the  canton,  and  made  the 
Protestants  less  rigid  in  their  adherence  to  strict 
Protestant  principles.  But  although  the  (church,  in 
which  Zwingli  ministered,  has  been  burned  down, 
there  still  remains  one  relic  of  his  ministry  there, 
the  communion-cup,  which  is  in  possession  of  the 
congregation.  As  in  his  day  only  the  priest  drank 
the  wine,  it  is  certain  that  he  often  pressed  to  his 
lips  this  sacred  chalice  while  ministering  to  the 
people.  It  is  a  large  silver  cup,  adorned  with  fig- 
ures of  the  evangelists  set  in  precious  stones.  Of 
the  population  of  Glarus  nearly  eighty  per  cent,  are 
Reformed. 

From  Glarus,  Zwingli  was  called  to  Einsiedeln, 
an  abbey  in  an  upper  mountain  valley,  about  fifteen 
miles  west  of  Glarus  and  about  the  same  distance 
southeast  of  Zurich.    Here  he  was  not  parish  priest 


1 8      Famous  Places  of  Re  for  tned  Churches. 

as  at  Glarus.  There  was  nothing  but  the  abbey  at 
Einsiedeln.  He  was  preacher  at  the  abbey,  for  this 
abbey  had  for  centuries  been  a  pilgrimage  place 
for  thousands  of  pilgrims  from  Switzerland  and 
southern  Germany.  It  had  been  founded  by  Count 
Meinrad  in  the  ninth  century  in  honor  of  a  wonder- 
working image  of  the  virgin  called  the  "Black  Vir- 
gin." 

Einsiedeln  was  the  place  where  Zwingli's  work 
as  a  reformer  began.  Here  he  had  ample  time  to 
study.  Providence  set  him  aside  from  the  world 
for  a  while,  as  it  had  Moses  in  the  desert,  Paul  in 
Arabia  and  Luther  in  the  Wartburg,  to  prepare 
him  more  fully  for  his  great  lifework.  While  at 
Einsiedeln,  there  came  into  his  hands  an  epoch- 
making  book,  the  Greek  New  Testament,  published 
by  Erasmus  of  Basle,  in  1516.  (Before  that  time 
the  New  Testament  was  printed  in  western  Europe 
only  in  Latin,  which  has  always  been  the  sacred 
language  of  the  Catholics).  Zwingli,  as  he  studied 
it,  soon  saw  very  clearly,  that  the  Catholic  Church 
had  diverged  on  many  points  from  the  purity  and 
simplicity  of  the  New  Testament.  So  interested 
did  he  become,  that  he  committed  whole  Epistles 
to  memory  and  thus  became  a  mighty  man  of  the 


Zurich  and  Zwingli-land. 


19 


Word  of  God.  This  knowledge  of  the  Scriptures 
became  of  very  great  value  to  him  later,  when  he 
entered  into  public  disputations  with  the  Catholics, 
and  enabled  him  easily  to  defeat  them  out  of  the 


E1NSIEDELN 


Word  of  God.  So  Einsiedeln  became  the  real  birth- 
place of  the  Reformed  Churches.  For  in  1523  he 
thus  describes  his  preaching  at  Einsiedeln,  "I  began 
to  preach  the  Gospel  of  Christ  in  the  year  15 16, 
before  any  one  in  my  locality  had  so  much  as  heard 
the  name  of  Luther ;  for  I  never  left  the  pulpit 
without  taking  the  words  of  the  Gospel,  as  used  in 
the  mass  service  of  the  day  and  expounding  them 


20      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

by  means  of  the  Scriptures;  although  at  first  I  re- 
lied much  upon  the  Fathers  as  expositors  and  ex- 
plainers."* Tradition  has  it  that  Zwingli  preached 
at  Einsiedeln  on  "Christ,  as  the  ransom  for 
sin, — that  Christ  alone  saves  and  saves  every- 
where." This  was  contrary  to  Catholicism,  and 
against  the  rule  of  that  abbey,  over  whose  door  were 
inscribed  the  words,  "Here  sins  are  forgiven  by  the 
Virgin  Mary."  Thus  the  seed  that  Wyttenbach 
planted  in  his  mind  at  Basle  ten  years  before,  came 
to  fruitage  in  making  him  a  reformer.  His  elo- 
quent preaching  produced  great  results.  Many  of 
the  pilgrims,  who  came  hither  filled  with  the  super- 
stitions of  Catholicism,  caught  the  new  vision  of 
truth  and  went  home  scattering  the  glad  tidings. 
Says  one  of  the  pilgrims  who  heard  him :  "How 
beautiful  and  profound,  how  grave  and  how  con- 
vincing, how  moving  and  agreeable  to  the  Gospel 
is  that  discourse."  While  he  was  at  Einsiedeln, 
Samson,  like  Tetzel  in   Germany    (against  whom 


*This  would  make  the  origin  of  the  Reformed  Church 
earlier  than  the  Lutheran,  whose  origin  is  generally- 
dated  from  October  31,  1517,  when  Luther  nailed  the 
theses  on  the  church  door  at  Wittenberg. 


Zurich  and  Zivingli-land.  21 

Luther  protested),  came  to  Switzerland  selling 
indulgences.  Zwingli  boldly  inveighed  against 
him  just  as  Luther  did.  The  pope  tried  to  bribe 
him  to  keep  quiet,  by  offers  of  high  rank  in  the 
Catholic  Church,  yes,  even  of  making  him  a  cardi- 
nal, it  is  said.  The  pope  threatened  Luther  by  is- 
suing a  bull  against  him,  but  Zwingli  he  tried  to 
win  by  flattery.  But  the  brave  reformer  was  above 
such  temptations  and  repelled  the  offer,  saying:  "By 
God's  help  I  mean  to  preach  the  Gospel  and  that 
will  shake  Rome."  Thus  Einsiedeln  became  the 
birthplace  of  the  Reformed  faith. 

Although  the  reformation  began  at  Einsiedeln, 
yet  at  Zwingli 's  death  that  abbey  fell  back  to  the 
Catholic  faith  owing  to  the  unfortunate  defeat  of 
the  Reformed,  at  the  battle  of  Cappel  in  1531, 
where  Zwingli  was  killed.  And  soon  the  Catholics 
made  it  as  great  a  pilgrim-shrine  as  ever.  To-day 
it  is  said  that  160,000  pilgrims  go  up  there  annually 
from  Switzerland  and  southern  Germany,  to  wor- 
ship at  the  shrine  of  the  Black  Virgin.  The  abbey 
building,  that  was  there  in  Zwingli's  time,  was  de- 
stroyed by  fire  about  two  hundred  years  ago  and 
the  present  buildings  erected  1704-20.  "Here,"  says 
Badecker  in  his  guidebook,  "the  monks  spend  their 


22       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

time  in  reading  masses  for  the  pilgrims,  receiving 
their  offerings  .and  in  raising  a  fine  breed  of 
horses."  From  this  it  is  evident  that  there  is  need 
of  some  new  Zwingli  to  again  preach  there  against 
the  errors  of  Rome  and  open  the  eyes  of  the  pil- 
grims to  the  truth  as  it  is  in  Christ.  A  town  of 
about  four  thousand  people  has  grown  up  around 
the  abbey,  and  especially  the  open  place  in  front 
of  it  is  filled  with  booths  and  stores,  for  the  sale 
of  such  relics  of  Romish  superstition  as  rosaries, 
crucifixes,  wax  images  and  statues  of  the  virgin. 
Just  in  front  of  the  abbey  is  a  fountain,  which  has 
twelve  faucets,  from  which  the  water  pours.  These 
are  named  after  the  twelve  apostles,  and  the  pil- 
grims are  expected  to  take  a  drink  at  each  of  them. 
As  the  water  flows  forth  in  a  strong  stream  and 
there  is  no  protection  against  getting  wet,  this  cus- 
tom often  resolves  itself  into  an  awkward  and 
ridiculous  sort  of  a  skirt-dance  on  the  part  of  the 
female  sex  as  they  try  to  drink  of  the  sacred  water 
at  each  of  the  faucets  without  getting  their  skirts 
wet.  On  one  occasion,  when  the  abbey  was  visited 
by  1,500  pilgrims  from  southern  Germany,  we  saw 
at  nine  P.  M.  a  long  and  solemn  procession  of  pil- 
grims walking  two  and  two,  each  with  a  lighted 


Zurich  and  Zwingli-land.  23 

candle,  up  the  hill  behind  the  abbey  to  the  statue 
of  Count  Meinrad.  It  was  a  weird  sight  as  they 
walked  through  the  pines.  And  when  they  return- 
ed to  the  abbey,  they  sang  beautiful  hymns  in  a 
grand  chorus,  for  it  is  the  custom  of  the  Catholics 
in  many  parts  of  western  Germany  to  have  congre- 
gational singing. 

But  Zwingli  was  becoming  too  prominent  for 
that  little  mountain  abbey  at  Einsiedeln.  His 
preaching  had  made  him  famous  all  over  German 
Switzerland  and  he  was  beginning  to  shake  the  can- 
ton of  Zurich.  So  he  was  called  to  the  capital  of 
the  canton,  Zurich,  as  priest  of  the  cathedral  there, 
— the  two-towered  church  on  the  north  of  the  river 
Limmat,  in  the  eastern  part  of  the  city,  just  below 
where  the  Limmat  flows  out  of  lake  Zurich.  Up 
in  one  of  the  towers  of  the  cathedral  is  a  statue 
of  king  Charlemagne  with  a  gilded  crown  and 
sword,  for  Charlemagne  had  given  important  gifts 
to  the  church  in  his  day.  Zwingli  was  now  fulfill- 
ing the  spirit  of  Charlemagne,  for  in  Charlemagne's 
age,  an  attempt  was  made  to  get  rid  of  the  image- 
worship  in  the  Catholic  Church,  and  Zwingli 
was  now  preparing  for  a  more  thorough  purging  of 
the  church.     Now  a  greater  than  Charlemagne,  a 


24      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

new  leader,  a  spiritual  Charlemagne,  not  a  dead 
statue  as  of  Charlemagne  in  the  tower,  but  a  living 
herald  of  eternal  truth,  appeared  and  began  his 
great  work  of  reforming  the  Church. 


Chapter     II.— ZURICH,     THE     ORIGINAL 
CHURCH  OF  THE  REFORMED. 

ULRICH  ZWINGLI  came  to  Zurich  in  the 
latter  part  of  1518,  and  on  New  Year's 
day,  1 5 19,  he  entered  on  his  duties  at  the 
cathedral.  With  him  there  came  a  New  Year 
to  Zurich,  a  New  Year  of  Evangelical  light 
and  truth, — a  New  Year  that  has  lasted  ever 
since  in  that  city,  as  it  led  it  to  break  from 
the  trammels  of  the  papacy.  His  first  sermon 
was  the  key  to  all  that  followed.  "It  is  to  Christ 
I  wish  to  guide  you,  to  Christ  the  true  spring  of 
salvation."  He  announced  that  he  would  preach 
on  the  Gospel  of  Matthew,  verse  by  verse.  Such 
preaching  had  never  been  heard  in  Zurich,  for  the 
Bible  had  been  little  used  by  their  priests,  who  con- 
fined themselves  in  preaching  mainly  to  stories  of 
the  saints.  Zwingli  brought  them  back  to  the  Bible, 
that  was  his  great  boon  to  them.  Great  was  the  de- 
light of  many  at  his  preaching,  as  their  souls  were, 
now  for  the  first  time,  fed ;  but  great  also  was  the 
opposition  and  hatred  of  others.  The  market  place 
at  Zurich  was  not  far  from  the  cathedral  on  the 
north  side  of  the  Limmat  river.    To  accommodate 

27 


28      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

the  country  people,  who  came  to  market  and  who 
wanted  to  hear  the  new  Gospel,  Zwingli  also  preach- 
ed in  the  cathedral  on  Fridays,  the  market-day. 
The  country  people  then  carried  this  new  Gospel 
throughout  the  canton,  so  that  the  canton  received 
it  as  well  as  the  city. 

But  his  labors  became  so  severe  that  his  health 
broke  down  and  he  went  away  to  the  baths.  About 
fifty  miles  southeast  of  Zurich  is  a  famous  watering 
place,  Ragatz  Pfaffers,  situated  at  the  mouth  of  a 
narrow  gorge  in  the  mountains,  down  which  flows 
the  brawling  Tamina.  Here  he  was  recuperating 
when  the  news  came  that  the  awful  plague  had 
broken  out  at  Zurich.  Like  a  faithful  shepherd,  he 
at  once  went  back  to  his  suffering  flock.  He  was 
most  faithful  in  his  ministrations  and  caught  the 
plague,  which  brought  him  to  the  borders  of  the 
grave.  Indeed  the  rumor  had  already  gone  forth 
that  he  had  died.  But  his  life  was  providentially 
spared, — spared  for  great  purposes  so  as  to  com- 
plete the  reformation.  His  illness,  however,  greatly 
deepened  his  spirituality  and  better  prepared  him 
for  his  work.*  During  this  illness  he  wrote  his  first 
hymn : 

*Some  of  his  biographers,  especially  his  later  ones, 
place  his  conversion  at  this  time. 


Zurich — Original  Church  of  Reformed.       29 

"Lo,  at  my  door,  gaunt  death  I  spy, 
Hear,  Lord  of  life,  thy  creature's  cry." 

The  doctrines  of  the  reformation  rapidly  gained 
power  in  Zurich.  So  eloquent  was  his  preaching 
and  so  great  became  his  influence,  that  its  progress 
was  soon  marked  by  several  conferences.  The 
first  conference  was  held  in  January  29,  1523,  but 
before  it  happened,  a  controversy  took  place  on  the 
subject  of  fasting  in  Lent.  The  leaven  of  the 
Gospel  was  working  and  many  refused  to  fast  in 
Lent,  because  the  Bible  did  not  enjoin  it.  The  lead- 
er of  this  was  Froschauer,  the  great  printer  of 
Zurich,  who  declared  that  he  and  his  workmen 
would  not  fast  as  their  work  was  too  severe.  '  The 
great  council  of  the  city  finally  decided  (April, 
1522)  for  Zwingli  and  against  fasting.  This  was 
the  first  open  breach  with  Rome.  On  August  15, 
the  ministers  of  Zurich  decided  not  to  preach  any- 
thing that  was  not  contained  in  the  Bible.  But  the 
first  great  disputation  occurred  January  29,  1523. 
Just  as  Luther  had  nailed  his  theses  on  the  church 
door  at  Wittenberg  at  the  beginning  of  the  reforma- 
tion, so  now  Zwingli  published  67  articles  against 
the  Catholic  doctrines  of  the  papacy,  the  mass,  the 
intercession    of    the    saints,    fasts,   purgatory,    etc. 


30      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

The  disputation  was  held  in  the  city  hall  before  600 
auditors.  At  a  table  in  the  middle  of  the  room  he 
sat  with  the  Bible  in  Latin  and  also  in  the  original 
tongues  before  him.  He  claimed  that  it  alone  had 
supreme  authority  for  their  decisions.  The  result 
was  a  complete  victory  for  Zwingli  and  the  city 
council  ordered  that  nothing  should  be  taught  in 
the  churches  that  was  not  founded  on  the  Bible. 

The  second  great  disputation  took  place  on  Oc- 
tober 26-28,  1523,  at  the  same  place  before  200 
persons.  Before  it  occurred,  however,  the  bolder 
spirits  of  the  reform  attacked  the  use  of  images 
in  the  churches,  declaring  that  it  was  idolatry.  So 
the  subject  of  this  conference  was  the  use  of  im- 
ages and  also  the  observance  of  the  mass.  At  it, 
Zwingli  and  Leo  Juda,  the  pastor  of  St.  Peters 
Church  at  Zurich,  defended  the  Reformed  doc- 
trines. As  a  result  of  this  conference,  the  city 
council  ordered  that  by  the  next  year  all  pictures 
and  statues  should  be  cast  out  of  the  churches ;  yes, 
even  the  organ,  which  was  looked  upon  as  a  relic 
of  papacy ;  so  that  for  many  years  the  early  Re- 
formed Church  of  Zurich  had  no  music,  not  even 
singing.  The  only  thing  that  was  now  left  remain- 
ing of  the  Catholic  service  was  the  mass.    But  that, 


Zurich — Original  Church  of  Reformed.      31 

too,  was  soon  to  be  changed.  Finally  on  Easter, 
April  13,  1525,  the  reformation  was  completed  at 
Zurich  as  the  Lord's  Supper  was  celebrated  in  the 
Protestant  mode,  by  giving  the  cup  as  well  as  the 
bread  to  the  church  members,  which  was  contrary 
to  Catholic  custom.  Zurich  thus  declared  her  in- 
dependence of  the  bishop  of  Constance  and  of  the 
pope,  her  Catholic  rulers.  This  Lord's  Supper 
greatly  impressed  the  people  with  its  severe  sim- 
plicity. Instead  of  the  elaborate  service  of  the  mass, 
the  service  was  very  simple ;  instead  of  the  costly 
chalice,  only  wooden  plates  and  goblets  were  used. 
The  people  sat  during  the  communion  in  contrast 
with  the  kneeling  of  the  Catholics  at  the  commu- 
nion, which  seemed  to  them  idolatry  (artolotry  or 
bread-worship),  while  the  students  of  the  cathedral 
school  assisted  Zwingli  in  passing  the  elements. 
The  Zurich  Church  still  makes  use  of  the  sitting 
communion,  although  in  the  country  it  was  received 
standing,  as  in  Germany,  by  the  communicants.* 


*Opposite  the  cathedral  on  the  north  side  of  the 
Munster  Platz  is  the  parsonage  of  the  antistes  or  head 
of  the  church,  but  Zwingli's  house  was  on  the  Kirch- 
gasse  just  north  of  the  cathedral,  where  a  slab  in  the 
house  marks  its   locality.     The   room   in   it,   called  his 


32      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

During  the  brief  remaining  life  of  Zwingli,  sev- 
eral important  events  occurred,  to  which  we  shall 
only  refer  as  they  will  be  treated  in  connection  with 
their  proper  localities.  In  1526  a  great  conference 
was  held  at  Baden,  in  Switzerland,  but  Zwingli  did 
not  dare  go  thither,  so  Ecolampadius,  the  reformer 
of  Basle,  defended  the  Protestant  views.  In  Janu- 
ary, 1528,  a  great  conference  was  held  at  Bern, 
which  he  attended  and  which  resulted  in  making 
that  canton  Protestant.  In  1 529,  Zurich  was  threat- 
ened with  a  war  with  the  five  Forest  cantons.  These 
were  the  five  mountain  cantons  south  of  her,  Zug, 
Lucerne,  Uri,  Schwytz  and  Unterwalden.  In  those 
days  the  mountaineers  were  conservative,  retaining 
the  old  faith,  while  the  cities  were  progressive,  ac- 
cepting the  new.  But  this  threatened  war  was 
brought  to  an  end  June,  1529,  without  bloodshed 
by  a  peace  which  was  called  "the  milk-soup  peace" 
because  the  soldiers  of  the  two  armies  fraternized 
so  cordially  that  they  ate  milk-soup  out  of  the  same 
dish.  On  this  occasion  Zwingli  wrote  his  second 
hymn: 


study  and  the  adjoining  room,  called  his  bedroom,  may 
be  the  same  as  in  his  time,  but  the  rest  of  the  house 
has  been  reconstructed. 


Zurich — Original  Church  of  Reformed.       33 

Do  thou'  direct  thy  chariot,  Lord 

And  guide  it  at  thy  will. 
Without  thy  aid  our  strength  is  vain, 

And   useless   all   our   skill. 
Look  down  upon  thy  saints  brought  low 
And  prostrate  laid  beneath  the  foe. 

Send    down    thy    peace    and    banish    strife, 

Let  bitterness  depart; 
Revive  the  spirit  of  the  past 

In  every  Switzer's  heart; 
Then  shall   the   church   forever  sing 
The  praises  of  her  heavenly  king. 

But  perhaps  the  most  important  event  in  his  life 
was  the  conference  at  Marburg,  in  Germany,  in 
October,  1529,  where  Zwingli  and  Ecolampadius, 
together  with  Bucer  and  Capito  of  Strassburg,  met 
Luther  and  Afelancthon,  of  the  Lutheran  Church, 
in  order  that,  at  the  suggestion  of  the  Landgrave  of 
Hesse,  the  two  churches  might  become  united.* 
The  effort  at  union  unfortunately  failed.  Zwingli 
continued  as  antistes  or  head  of  the  Church  at  Zu- 
rich until  his  death  October  11,  1531,  in  the  battle- 
field of  Cappel.f 

*See  in  Book  II,  Chapter  4  of  this  work. 
fThe    best   way    to    reach    the   battlefield    of    Cappel    is 
to  go  to  Baar,  a  station  on  the  fast-line  between  Zu- 


34      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

The  five  mountain  cantons,  which  had  before  al- 
most attacked  Zurich  during  the  first  Cappel  war 
in  1529,  now  suddenly  precipitated  an  army  against 
Zurich.  Zurich  was  unprepared  for  the  attack  but 
ordered  her  soldiers  out,  Zwingli  going  along  as 
chaplain.  As  he  started  to  mount  his  horse  before 
his  house,  the  horse  stepped  backward,  which  was 
looked  upon  by  many  as  a  bad  omen.  The  Zurich 
army  marched  out  through  Horgen  and  over  the 
mountain  to  Cappel,  where  they  met  their  enemies 
and  were  severely  defeated.  Zwingli  was  felled 
to  the  ground  by  a  stone,  while  ministering  to  a 
soldier.  The  Catholic  soldiers  gathered  around 
him,  one  of  them  asking  whether  he  desired  a  priest, 
that  he  might  confess  his  sins  before  he  died.  He 
shook  his  head,  refusing.  Then  he  was  recognized 
by  one  of  the  soldiers  and  quickly  killed.  His 
body  was  afterward  burned  and  the  ashes  scatter- 
ed to  the  winds.  So  died  Zwingli,  the  only  one  of 
the  great  reformers  of  Continental  Europe  to  die  a 


rich  and  Zug,  and  there  hire  a  carriage  for  a  short 
ride  to  the  town  of  Cappel,  and  to  the  monument  about 
a  mile- away  from  the  town.  It  can  also  be  reached  by 
carriage  from  Zug  on  the  south  and  Mettmenstetten 
on  the  west. 


Zurich — Original  Church  of  Reformed.       35 

martyr's  death.  There  is  now  at  Cappel  a  stone 
monument  about  eighteen  feet  high,  of  rough 
mountain-stone  with  a  bronze  tablet  in  it,  on  which 
is  an  inscription  to  his  memory.  He  died  under  a 
pear  tree  and  since  his  death,  whenever  the  pear 
tree  dies,  another  is  planted  in  its  place,  so  that 
there  is  beside  the  monument  a  pear  tree,  which 
marks  the  exact  place  of  his  death. 

One  of  the  most  beautiful  sights  in  Switzerland 
is  the  Alpine-glow  at  sunset.  Then  the  snow-white 
Alps  turn  gradually  to  a  delicate  pink  and  often 
to  a  bright  crimson,  then  back  to  pink,  and  finally 
to  a  ghostly  white.  In  the  moonlight  they  seem 
to  be  a  mere  shadow  of  their  former  selves.  Such 
an  Alpine-glow  hung  over  Zwingli's  death.  He 
died  but  he  died  in  glory,  true  to  the  Reformed  doc- 
trines to  the  last.  His  coat  of  arms  is  black  and  old 
gold.  He  went  from  the  blackness  of  earth  to  the 
eternal  glory  of  God's  throne.* 


*It  is  comparatively  easy  to  visit  these  sacred  places 
in  Zwingli's  life  from  Zurich.  By  a  one  day's  trip 
Glarus,  Einsiedeln  and  Cappel  can  be  reached.  An- 
other day  will  add  Wildhaus,  which  is  best  reached 
from  Buchs  in  the  Rhine  valley  and  on  the  return  trip 
the  night  can  be  spent  at  Ragatz  or  Glarus  and  the 
rest  of  the  Zwingli  places  mentioned  above  visited  the 
next  dav. 


Chapter    III.— ZURICH    SINCE    ZWINGLI'S 
TIME. 

HENRY  Bullinger  was  Zwingli's  successor 
as  antistes  or  head-minister  of  the  Zu- 
rich Church.  With  the  defeat  of  the  Zu- 
rich army  at  Cappel  in  1531,  and  the  death  of 
Zwingli,  all  was  confusion  at  Zurich.  Young  Bul- 
linger, who  came  there  as  a  refugee,  with  the  bold- 
ness of  youth  preached  so  bravely  and  eloquently 
that  he  was  elected  antistes.  He  proved  to  be  the 
man  for  the  hour,  a  fit  successor  to  Zwingli.  It 
was  during  his  life  that  Zurich  was  brought  into 
such  intimate  relations  with  England.  Many  Eng- 
lish refugees,  fleeing  from  the  persecutions  of  Queen 
Mary,  found  a  cordial  welcome  here.  Some  of 
them  even  finding  a  home  in  his  house.  A  sem- 
inary for  English  theological  students  under  Bul- 
linger's  patronage  existed  at  Zurich  for  a  short 
time,  while  the  English  refugees  were  there.  Some 
of  the  ministers  who  went  back  to  England  became 
prominent  as  bishops  of  the  Anglican  Church.  A 
number  of  English  books  were  published  at  Zurich 
by  Froschauer,  the  great  Reformed  printer  of  Zu- 
37 


38      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

rich,*  who  printed  the  first  English  Bible  at 
Zurich,  while  as  yet  its  publication  was  forbidden 
in  England.  It  was  called  the  Matthew  Bible,  pub- 
lished in  1550.  He  also  published  the  first  cate- 
chism of  the  Anglican  Church.  For  his  kindness 
Bullinger  was  thanked  by  many  of  the  refugees. f 
Queen  Elizabeth  presented  a  goblet  to  Bullinger  in 
1560,  which  is  in  the  Swiss  national  museum  at  Zu- 
rich. Bullinger  was  the  author  of  the  great  creed 
of  the  Swiss  Church,  adopted  by  all  the  cantons, 
the  Second  Helvetic  Confession   (1566).     He  died 

in  1575- 

Bullinger  was  succeeded  by  a  prominent  theo- 
logian and  preacher,  Rudolf  Gualther,  who  was 
married  to  Zwingli's  daughter,  Regula.  Bullinger 
had  taken  Zwingli's  family  into  his  own  home  after 
Zwingli's  death,  and  he  also  took  into  his  home 
young  students  for  the  ministry,  among  them 
young  Gualther.  What  more  natural  than  that 
these  two  young  people  should   fall   in  love  and 


*His  name  is  derived  from  the  German  word 
"Frosch,"  which  means  a  frog.  And  in  almost  all  of 
his  book-plates,  a  frog  is  to  be  seen  somewhere. 

fTheir  letters  from  England  were  published  in  the 
"Zurich  Letters"  about  fifty  years  ago. 


Zurich  Since  Zwingli's  Time.  39 

marry  each  other.  Gualther  was  famous  for  his 
published  homilies  on  the  Scripture.  He  was  an 
elegant,  polished  writer. 

It  is  not  until  the  seventh  antistes  that  we  come 
again  to  a  great  man,  John  Jacob  Breitinger,  who 
was  antistes  1613-1645.  He  represented  Zurich  at 
the  synod  of  Dort  in  Holland  (1618-9)  and  was 
greatly  respected  by  that  synod  because  of  his  abil- 
ity and  because  he  represented  the  mother-church 
of  the  Reformed.  He  introduced  singing  into  the 
Church  of  Zurich.  But  at  first  this  was  not  popu- 
lar, for  when  the  hymn  was  first  sung  at  the  close 
of  the  service,  many  of  the  older  people  went  out, 
thus  protesting  against  it  as  a  novelty  in  the  church. 
One  of  Breitinger's  greatest  acts  was  the  founda- 
tion of  the  present  school  system  of  Zurich.  He 
also  led  to  the  foundation  of  the  city-library,  which 
is  now  located  in  the  Water  Church. 

Many  famous  men  appeared  at  Zurich  in  the 
seventeenth  century  as  Prof.  John  Henry  Hottinger, 
the  great  Orientalist  (1620-1667),  and  Prof.  John 
Henry  Heidegger,  the  theologian  (1633-1698).  He 
was  one  of  the  theological  triumvirate,  who  drew 
up  the  last  great  Swiss  creed,  the  Helvetic  Con- 
sensus in  1675,  Gernler,  of  Basle,  and  F.  Turretin, 


40      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

of  Geneva,  being  the  other  two.  It  was  directed 
against  the  supposed  departure  of  the  Theological 
School  of  Saumur  in  France  on  the  doctrines  of 
predestination,  the  imputation  of  Adam's  sin  and 
the  inspiration  of  the  Bible. 

Another  very  famous  minister  appeared  at  Zu- 
rich a  century  and  a  half  later,  about  the  end  of  the 
eighteenth  century,  John  Casper  Lavater.  He  was 
one  of  the  greatest  literary  and  religious  characters 
of  his  age.  He  was  perhaps  the  most  brilliant  mind 
that  Zurich  has  produced.  He  was  a  pious  boy  in 
his  youth,  but  was  led  out  of  his  simple  faith  by  the 
rationalism  then  prevailing  in  the  schools,  even  the 
antistes  at  that  time  belonging  to  the  rationalistic 
party.  He  was  a  great  lover  of  liberty,  and  liberty 
of  thought  possessed  a  charm  for  him  so  that  he 
was  easily  led  off  to  rationalism.  But  after  he  had 
been  in  the  ministry  about  fifteen  years  and  while 
pastor  of  St.  Peters  Church  at  Zurich,  he  changed 
his  faith.  His  early  religious  nature  reasserted  it- 
self and  rose  up  again  against  rationalism.  He 
created  a  great  sensation  by  attacking  rationalism 
in  the  Zurich  synod.  From  that  day  he  had  to  en- 
dure persecution  and  ridicule  for  being  what  his 
enemies  called  a  Pietist.     But  he  boldly  stood  his 


Zurich  Since  Zwingli's  Time.  41 

ground  in  defence  of  Evangelical  Christianity. 
His  boldness  appears  all  the  greater,  when  it  is  re- 
membered that  in  his  day,  the  prominent  defenders 
of  Evangelical  Christianity  in  the  German  lan- 
guage could  be  counted  on  the  fingers  of  one  hand, 
Claudius,  Hainan,  Stilling  and  Lavater  being  the 
most  prominent.  Goethe,  the  great  German  poet, 
was  a  very  warm  friend  of  Lavater.  He  said  of 
Lavater  that  he  was  "one,  the  like  of  whom  has  not 
been  seen  and  will  not  be  seen  again."  But  Lava- 
ter's  defence  of  evangelical  religion,  lost  for  him 
Goethe's  friendship.  For  his  brave  defence  of 
orthodoxy,  he  was  styled  by  his  friends,  the  second 
reformer  of  Zurich.  As  Zwingli  had  led  the 
church  out  of  Romanism  in  the  16th  century,  so 
Lavater  led  it  back  from  rationalism  in  the  18th 
century. 

He  was  not  only  one  of  the  most  eloquent  preach- 
ers of  his  day,  but  also  one  of  the  greatest  of  the 
Swiss  poets  (especially  in  his  "Swiss  Hymns"). 
And  he  became  also  famous  for  his  patriotism. 
When  France  took  possession  of  Switzerland,  his 
voice  was  almost  the  only  one  lifted  up  publicly  in 
favor  of  freedom.  He  had  the  daring  single- 
handedness    to    throw    down    a    challenge    to    the 


42      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

French  government  in  his  "Appeal  of  a  Free 
Swiss."  He  was  the  "William  Tell"  of  his 
age.  His  zeal  for  patriotism  led  to  his  death. 
He  was  arrested  for  treason  by  the  French  in  1799, 
but  soon  released.  However,  when  the  French 
captured  Zurich  from  the  allies  on  September, 
1799,  he  was  shot  by  a  French  soldier  and  lingered 
often  in  mortal  agony  for  a  year  and  a  half,  until 
he  died  January  2,  1801.  He  was  a  very  remark- 
able man  in  his  appearance,  with  his  sharp  face  and 
keen,  piercing  eyes.  His  was  a  countenance  that 
at  once  attracted  attention.  He  acquired  a  great 
reputation  as  a  physiognomist.  He  published  a 
large  work  on  that  subject  and  was  able  to  read 
faces  with  remarkable  facility.  He  was  also  a 
fine  religious  poet,  writing  100  hymns,  one  of  which 
reads  thus: 

O  Jesus  Christ  grow  thou  in  us, 

And  all  things  else  recede. 
My  heart  is  daily  nearer  thee 

From  sin  be  daily  freed. 
Make  this  poor  self  grow  less  and  less, 

Be  thou  my  light  and  aim. 
O  make  me  daily  through  thy  grace, 

More  worthy  of  thy  name. 


Zurich  Since  Zwingli's  Time.  43 

With  Lavater  should  be  mentioned  John  Jacob 
Hess,  who  was  antistes  (1795-1828),  the  fifth  and 
last  of  the  great  antistes  of  Zurich,  the  others  being 
Zwingli,  Bullinger,  Gualther  and  Breitinger.  He 
was  a  scholar,  and  a  genius  in  common  sense,  just 
the  man  to  guide  the  Church  during  the  stormy  pe- 
riod of  the  French  occupation.  His  poise  of  char- 
acter is  revealed  by  an  incident,  that  when  the 
French  were  bombarding  Zurich,  he  calmly  wrote 
his  sermon  for  the  next  Sunday.  He  is  famous 
for  having  written  the  first  scholarly  life  of  Christ 
(1782),  the  forerunner  of  many  lives  of  Christ  in 
the  nineteenth  century. 

Another  famous  character  of  the  Reformed  of 
Zurich  was  Henry  Pestalozzi,  who  revolutionized 
modern  education.  He  was  born  at  Zurich  in  1746, 
and  grew  up  a  dreamy,  awkward  boy,  often  ridi- 
culed by  his  companions  as  "Henry  Oddity  of  Fool- 
borough."  He  studied  law,  but  gave  it  up  for  farm- 
ing in  which  he  failed  financially.  Influenced  by 
the  book  "Emile,"  published  by  Rosseau,  he  started 
(1775)  a  school  for  the  poor  at  Neuhof,  which, 
however,  only  brought  him  into  deeper  poverty.  In 
1 78 1  his  novel  "Leonard  and  Gertrude"  brought 
him  fame.     It  is  a  charming  description  of  Swiss 


44      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

village  life.  In  1798  he  was  placed  in  charge  of 
the  orphans  left  by  the  French  invasion  at  Stans. 
The  results  of  his  teaching  were  surprising.  He 
then  became  teacher  at  Burgdorf  in  Bern,  and  in 
1802  he  embodied  his  ideas  of  education  in  a  work 
"How  Gertrude  teaches  her  Children."  Finally,  in 
1802,  he  opened  a  school  at  Yverdon  in  the  canton 
of  Vaud.  By  this  time  his  methods  of  teaching 
had  become  famous  and  teachers  from  all  over  Eu- 
rope, yes,  even  kings  and  philosophers,  came  to 
visit  him  and  inspect  his  work.  But  great  as  he 
was  as  an  educator,  he  was  poor  as  a  financier,  and 
he  was  at  last  compelled  to  give  up  his  school  at 
Yverdon.  He  died  1827,  having  seen  as  he  sup- 
posed the  apparent  failure  of  his  plans.  But  he 
had  not  failed,  for  his  ideas  began  to  be  used  every- 
where, and  twenty  years  after  his  death,  educators 
all  over  Europe  bore  tribute  to  him.  His  educa- 
tional principles  seem  briefly  to  have  been  the  fol- 
lowing : 

1.  That  education  should  be  education  rather 
than  instruction,  a  drawing  out  of  the  pupil  rather 
than  a  pouring  of  thought  into  him.  Education  pre- 
viously had  looked  on  the  child  as  an  automaton 
and  compelled  all  children  to  learn  alike  through 


Zurich  Since  Zzvingli's  Time.  45 

set  forms.  His  method  adapted  the  education  to 
each  child,  by  the  teacher  drawing  out  the  child 
and  suiting  the  instruction  to  the  child's  ideas. 

2.  He  was  the  father  of  what  we  call  the  object 
lessons  or  kindergarten  system, — that  knowledge 
should  be  taught  in  the  concrete  rather  than  in  the 
abstract. 

3.  He  laid  the  foundations  for  universal  educa- 
tion. In  his  day  only  the  rich  had  the  opportunity 
for  education ;  and  then  only  the  boys,  for 
girls'  schools  were  almost  unknown.  He,  by  his 
work  at.  Neuhof  and  Stans  showed  that  all  chil- 
dren, even  the  poor  children,  could  be  educated. 
This  led  to  the  adoption  of  universal  education. 
And  it  was  not  long  before  Prussia  adopted  his 
ideas  and  made  education  compulsory,  with  the  ul- 
timate result  that  Prussia  is  now  at  the  head  of 
Germany. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  nineteenth  century,  Zu- 
rich together  with  the  rest  of  Switzerland,  under- 
went a  political  revolution.  Switzerland  had  not 
been  the  land  of  the  free, — a  democracy.  Univer- 
sal suffrage  was  unknown  in  the  larger  cities,  which 
were  aristocracies.  Hence  about  1830  a  revolution 
took  place  in  the  leading  cantons  of  Switzerland, 


46      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

which  led  to  universal  suffrage.  The  liberals  in 
politics  were  mainly  rationalists  in  religion,  op- 
posing the  old  regime,  where  the  church  was  con- 
nected with  the  state,  and  the  church,  therefore, 
suffered  with  the  state.  So  in  1839  this  party,  lib- 
eral in  politics  and  rationalistic  in  religion,  having 
gotten  control  in  Zurich,  called  Frederick  Strauss, 
the  author  of  the  famous  rationalistic  (Hegelian) 
life  of  Christ,  as  professor  of  theology  at  Zurich. 
This  created  a  tremendous  revolt  and  a  petition  of 
40,000  citizens  went  up  to  the  Zurich  council  against 
his  coming.  Strauss  was  kept  away  by  being  given 
a  pension  which  he  continued  to  receive  until  his 
death.  But  though  Strauss  did  not  come,  the  ma- 
jority of  the  people,  who  were  still  pious,  had  lost 
faith  in  that  council,  and  they  feared  that  an  at- 
tempt would  be  made  to  make  rationalistic  all  the 
schools  as  well  as  the  university,  so  they  held  a 
great  meeting  at  Kloten,  on  August,  1839,  where 
about  15,000  were  present.  Matters  reached  a  cri- 
sis on  September  6,  at  Zurich,  as  the  Christian 
citizens  marched  into  Zurich  and  after  being  fired 
upon  by  the  Zurich  troops,  in  which  several  were 
killed,  they  took  control  of  the  city.  As  the  city 
council  had  fled,  they  ordered  a  new  election,  which 


Zurich  Since  Zzvingli's  Time.  47 

resulted  against  the  radicals.  An  Evangelical  pro- 
fessor was  called,  who  came  instead  of  Strauss, 
Lange  and  Ebrard,  both  Evangelical,  later  becom- 
ing professors. 

The  Zurich  Church,  as  are  most  of  the  Protestant 
Churches  in  Switzerland,  is  divided  into  orthodox, 
rationalists  and  mediates,  the  latter  holding  views 
somewhere  between  the  other  two.  At  the  univer- 
sity the  only  orthodox  professor  of  theology  is 
Prof.  Schulthess,  though  the  private  docent  Ruegg 
is  also  of  that  type.  The  churches  of  Fraumun- 
ster  and  Neuminster  in  the  city  of  Zurich  have 
Evangelical  ministers,  while  St.  Peter's  and  Enge 
do  not.  There  is  generally  an  Evangelical  minister 
at  the  cathedral,  the  last  one,  Mr.  Pestalozzi,  hav- 
ing died  but  a  short  time  ago.  The  stronghold  of 
the  Evangelicals  in  the  canton  of  Zurich  is  the 
Evangelical  Society  of  Zurich  (indeed  each  Protes- 
tant canton  usually  has  an  Evangelical  society, 
which  combats  rationalism  and  aids  Evangelical- 
ism). Another  stronghold  of  the  Evangelicals  is 
the  St.  Anna  chapel,  founded  by  a  pious  lady  of 
Zurich,  Matilda  Escher,  in  1864,  and  devoted  to 
all  kinds  of  aggressive  church-work.  The  Evan- 
gelicals also  have  a  school  in  Zurich.    There  is  need 


48      Faomuh  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

for  some  later  Zwingli  or  Lavater  to  come  to  Zu- 
rich and  reclaim  her  to  the  true  faith,  although  there 
are  brave  defenders  of  it  there. 

As  a  result  of  all  this  religious  history,  Zurich 
to-day  has  a  number  of  very  interesting  places. 
First  of  all  is  the  cathedral,  where  Zwingli  preach- 
ed. It  is  a  large  building,  but  in  its  interior  quite 
plain.  Around  it,  on  three  sides,  are  galleries. 
There  are  no  cushions  on  the  seats  and  carpets 
only  in  the  aisle.  Everything  is  very  plain  and 
old-fashioned,  except  that  there  is  a  fine  stained 
glass  window  in  the  choir,  containing  pictures  of 
Christ,  Peter  and  Paul.  We  repeatedly  attended 
service  there  and  found  it  carried  on  thus :  The 
minister  at  the  communion  table  *  gave  out  a  hymn, 
then  having  ascended  the  pulpit,  he  read  the  Scrip- 
ture, prayed  and  read  his  text.  During  the  reading 
of  the  Scripture,  the  prayer  and  the  reading  of  the 


*The  Swiss  churches  have  no  altars,  usually  not  even 
a  communion  table,  often  nothing  but  a  baptismal  font. 
This  communion  table  was  not  placed  in  the  choir 
until  about  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century,  as 
the  church  for  several  centuries  after  the  reformation 
was  divided,  the  choir  end  being  shut  off  by  a  wall 
from  the  main  room  and  used  by  the  French  congrega- 
tion. 


Zurich  Since  Zzvingli's  Time.  49 

text,  the  people  remained  standing.  But  as  soon 
as  the  minister  began  to  preach,  they  sat  down. 
This  is  an  old  custom,  coming  down  from  reforma- 
tion times.  The  people  stand  to  show  their  rev- 
erence for  the  Bible.  And  they  sit  down  to  show 
that  they  consider  the  minister's  words  in  the  ser- 
mon to  be  lower  than  those  of  the  Bible.*  This 
reverence  for  God's  Word  was  peculiar  to  the  Re- 
formed Church. 

Another  beautiful  scene  we  witnessed  there  was 
a  communion  service.  The  Zurich  Church  is  pe- 
culiar in  that  among  the  Reformed  Churches, 
where  the  German  language  is  used,  it  was  about 
the  only  one  where  the  communion  is  received  by 
the  communicants  sitting.  Elsewhere,  even  in  the 
country  in  Zurich  canton,  the  communicants  come 
forward  to  the  communion  table  and  receive  it 
standing.  We  found  that  they  also  used  unleaven- 
ed bread,  which  is  a  recent  innovation,  although  it 
was  not  in  the  form  of  wafers  and  had  no  cross  on 
it.  And  they  broke  the  bread,  for  bread-breaking 
was  always  emphasized  by  the  Reformed,  on  which 


*Perhaps    they    also    sit    down    because    the   sermons 
used    to  be   long. 


50      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

subject  they  had  a  great  controversy  with  the 
Lutherans.  The  two  ministers  walked  from  the 
communion  table  down  the  aisle,  carrying  the  bread 
and  giving  some  to  the  person  at  the  end  of  the 
pew  who  passed  it  to  others  in  the  pew.  The 
ministers  were  followed  by  the  elders,  each  carry- 
ing a  tankard  of  wine  and  a  cup,  with  which  they 
served  the  communicants.  The  ministers  waited  at 
the  other  end  of  the  church,  until  all  had  been  serv- 
ed by  the  elders,  and  then  they,  with  the  elders, 
went  back  to  the  communion  table.  The  com- 
munion is  celebrated  on  Christmas,  Easter  (togeth- 
er with  Good  Friday),  Whitsunday  and  in  the  fall. 
Another  interesting  place  to  the  student  of  Swiss 
religious  history  is  the  city-library  in  the  Water- 
church  just  below  the  cathedral  on  the  northern 
bank  of  the  river  Limmat.  This  library  is  exceed- 
ingly rich  in  works  on  the  Swiss  reformation.  In 
it  on  the  third  floor  is  a  Zwingli  museum,  which 
contains  a  great  collection  of  books  and  pictures 
connected  with  the  life  of  the  great  reformer. 
There  is  the  portrait  of  Zwingli  by  Asper,  the  artist 
of  the  Swiss  reformation ;  also  Zwingli's  New 
Testament,  with  his  notes  in  his  own  handwriting; 
also  others  of  his  books  published  by  Froschauer. 


Zurich  Since  Zwingli's  Time.  51 

Here  is  also  the  first  English  Bible  (Matthews),  of 
which  we  have  spoken,  and  also  the  first  German 
Bible  published  in  the  reformation  (1530),  which 
was  four  years  before  the  publication  of  Luther's 
Bible.  This  so-called  Zurich  Bible  was  translated 
by  Zwingli  and  his  co-laborers  as  Leo  Juda,  al- 
though they  incorporated  in  it  parts  of  the  Luther 
Bible,  which  had  already  been  published,  but  added 
translations  of  their  own.*  We  might  remark  in 
this  connection,  that  the  number  of  editions  of 
the  Bible,  published  at  Zurich  in  the  reforma- 
tion is  amazing.  Froschauer  was  a  whole  Bible 
society  in  himself,  for  his  day  he  did  as  much 
work  as  a  Bible  society  does  to-day.  In  this 
museum  are  also  many  pictures  of  the  other 
reformers  and  of  places  interesting  in  Zwingli's 
life.  To  the  student  of  Reformed  Church  history 
there  is  no  library  so  full  of  original  information 
as   this.      Only   the    library   of   the   University   of 


*A  copy  of  this  first  edition  of  the  Zurich  Bible  is 
in  the  hands  of  General  Roller,  Harrisonburg,  Va.  The 
writer  has  a  copy  of  the  second  edition  of  1531,  which 
is  valuable,  because  it  contains  the  original  cuts  of 
Scripture  scenes  by  Holbein,  the  great  painter  of 
Basle. 


52      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Utrecht  can  rival  it  on  the  history  of  the  Heidel- 
berg Catechism. 

Just  east  of  this  Water-church,  stands  the  statue 
to  Zwingli,  erected  on  the  400th  anniversary  of  his 
birth  in  1884,  and  placed  on  the  supposed  spot 
where  he  landed  when  he  came  to  Zurich  as  its  re- 
former. Another  interesting  place  in  Zurich  is  the 
Swiss  National  Museum,  where  are  Zwingli's  arms, 
and  also  his  mug  and  the  goblets  presented  to  Bul- 
linger  by  Queen  Elizabeth  of  England.  St.  Peter's 
Church  contains  Lavater's  grave  and  the  house  in 
which  he  lived  is  near  the  church,  with  an  inscrip- 
tion on  it.  Pestalozzi  has  a  statue  in  the  Bahnhof 
Strasse  and  there  is  a  Pestalozzi  Museum  at  the 
Wollenhof. 


Chapter  IV.— BASLE  AND  ITS  BEAUTIFUL 
CATHEDRAL. 

IN  the  northwestern  corner  of  Switzerland,  ma- 
jestically located  on  the  west  side  of  the  blue, 
rapidly  flowing  Rhine,  lies  the  aristocratic, 
wealthy  city  of  Basle.  It  is  an  old  town,  having 
been  originally  founded  by  the  Romans  as  a  camp. 
Its  religious  centre  is  its  beautiful  cathedral,  built 
of  red  sand-stone,  covered  with  a  brightly  colored 
roof  and  its  end  being  flanked  by  two  towers.  The 
present  building  was  built  in  1365,  and  is  213  feet 
long  and  106  wide.  In  it,  before  the  reformation, 
was  held  one  of  the  great  reforming  councils  of 
the  Catholic  Church  (1431-1449),  which,  however, 
did  not  reform  that  church.  The  cloisters  that  ad- 
join the  cathedral  are  interesting,  for  they  were 
the  resort  of  Erasmus,  the  oracle  of  his  day,  who 
prepared  the  way  for  the  reformation  in  Europe. 
Basle  came  very  nearly  being  the  birth-place  of  the 
reformation  instead  of  Zurich  and  Wittenberg,  for 
"Erasmus  laid  the  egg  of  the  reformation  and 
Luther  hatched  it,"  is  the  old  proverb.  Erasmus, 
though  a  famous  scholar,  had  not  the  moral  courage 
to  be  a  reformer  and  did  not  break  with  Rome.     It 

55 


56       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

was  left  for  Luther  and  Zwingli  to  do  what  he  did 
not  do,  so  he  missed  the  great  opportunity  of  his 
life.  However  he  had  an  important  influence  in 
the  preparation  for  the  reformation  as  by  the  pub- 
lication of  his  Greek  Testament  in  15 16,  which  led 
Zwingli  to  become  a  reformer.* 

Before  the  reformation  broke  out,  several  inter- 
esting scenes  occurred  there.  Hither  Zwingli  came 
as  a  boy  of  ten  (1494)  to  study  three  years  at  the 
parochial  school  of  St.  Theodore's  Church.  Here 
he  first  began  to  reveal  his  remarkable  abilities,  es- 
pecially in  oratory  and  music.  Later,  in  1505,  he 
returned  here  to  complete  his  education  for  the 
priesthood  and  spent  about  a  year  as  a  teacher  in 
the  parochial  school  of  St.  Martin's  Church,  and 
also  in  attending  the  university.  It  was  at  this 
time  that  he  met  the  great  crisis  of  his  life.  Thom- 
as Wyttenbach  was  lecturing  at  the  university  as 
teacher  of  Greek.  He  introduced  Zwingli  to  the 
study  of  the  New  Testament.  He  planted  two  seed- 
thoughts  in  the  mind  of  young  Zwingli,  that  made 
him  the  future  reformer.  One  was,  that  the  time 
would  come,  when  not  the  church,  but  the  Bible, 


*Erasmus  died  1536,  in  the  house  of  Froebenius,  the 
printer,  at  18  Baumleingasse,  Basle. 


Basle  and  Its  Beautiful  Cathedral.  57 

would  be  the  ultimate  authority  in  religion.  The 
other  was,  that  sins  are  forgiven,  not  by  the  Vir- 
gin Mary,  but  through  the  ransom  of  Christ.  Wyt- 
tenbach  later  followed  his  illustrious  pupil  into 
Protestantism,  and  became  the  reformer  of  Biel, 
Switzerland.  But  he  has  been  forgotten  in  the 
greater  fame  of  his  illustrious  pupil,  Zwingli,  just 
as  Ananias,  who  baptized  Saul  at  Damascus,  is  for- 
gotten in  his  great  convert  Paul. 

But  another  man  than  Erasmus  or  Wyttenbach 
was  destined  to  become  the  reformer  of  Basle, 
Ecolampadius.  His  real  name  was  Hausschein, 
meaning  "the  light  of  the  house,"  which  he  latin- 
ized, according  to  the  custom  of  the  day,  into  Eco- 
lampadius. He  was  a  mild  and  gentle  reformer, 
not  having  the  impetuosity  of  either  Luther  or 
Zwingli, — more  like  Melancthon,  yet  without  the 
latter 's  vacillating  and  compromising  spirit;  for 
though  mild,  he  was  yet  firm  as  a  rock.  His  schol- 
arship was  of  the  highest  order,  as  is  shown  by  the 
fact  that  one  of  his  books,  the  "Dialogue,"  influ- 
enced Melancthon  to  lower  views  of  the  Lord's 
Supper.  Ecolampadius  became  the  twin  reformer 
with  Zwingli  of  German  Switzerland.  As  a  boy, 
he  had  been  disgusted  with  the  immorality  and  pro- 


58      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

fanity  of  the  priests.  He  attended  Basle  Univer- 
sity and  later  returned  again  to  Balse  (1518),  to 
aid  Erasmus  publish  the  second  edition  of  his 
Greek  New  Testament,  when  he  received  the  de- 
gree of  doctor  from  the  university.  But  he  soon 
went  away  to  Augsburg.  He  finally  entered  a  mon- 
astery to  seek  refuge  for  his  soul.  But  dissatisfied 
with  it,  he  soon  left  it,  saying,  "I  have  lost  the 
monk  but  I  have  found  the  Christian." 

In  1522  he  came  to  Basle  as  assistant  priest  of 
St.  Martin's  Church.  Others  as  Capito  at  the 
cathedral  had  before  him  tried  to  introduce  the  doc- 
trines of  the  reformation,  but  there  had  been  no 
permanent  results.  But  Ecolampadius'  work  told. 
In  1523  he  was  elected  lecturer  on  the  Bible  at  the 
university.  In  1524  William  Farel,  from  France, 
visited  Basle  and  had  a  disputation,  which  created 
a  sensation  and  exerted  an  influence  for  Protestant- 
ism. Ecolampadius  began  preaching  the  evangelical 
Gospel  quietly  but  clearly.  When  the  conference 
was  held  at  Baden  (1526)  he  was  the  leader  for 
the  Reformed  as  Zwingli  dared  not  be  present.  He 
there  made  a  great  impression  by  his  learning  and 
piety.  This  conference  made  an  impression  on 
Basle,  as  did  the  conference  at  Bern  (1528).    Ei- 


Basle  and  Its  Beautiful  Cathedral.  59 

nally  matters  came  to  a  crisis  in  1529.  Some  of  the 
Protestant  party  had  entered  St.  Martin's  Church, 
where   Ecolampadius   preached,   on   Good   Friday, 

1528,  and  carried  away  all  the  images.  On  Easter 
Monday,  the  same  was  done  at  the  Augustian 
Church.  Sermons  were  preached  in  St.  Martin's 
and  St.  Leonard's  against  the  papistical  abomina- 
tions in  the  cathedral.  The  result  was  that  Christ- 
mas of  that  year  was  spent  under  arms.  This  di- 
vided, warlike  condition  continued  until  February, 

1529.  Then  the  leader  of  the  Catholic  party  fled 
and  the  Reformed  people  went  to  the  cathedral  and 
the  other  Catholic  churches  and  threw  out  and 
burned  the  images.  On  Ash  Wednesday  some 
wags  said,  "the  idols  are  really  keeping  Ash  Wed- 
nesday to-day."  And  Ecolampadius  ironically  de- 
clared, "Thus  severely  did  they  treat  their  idols  and 
the  mass  died  of  grief  in  consequence."  The  city 
council  reorganized  the  government.  Ecolampadius 
was  made  preacher  at  the  cathedral  and  antistes  or 
head-minister  of  the  church.  New  professors  were 
called  to  the  university  and  the  university  thus  be- 
came Reformed,  the  first  university  to  do  so,  Hei- 
delberg being  the  next,  about  a  half  a  century  later. 
Ecolampadius  lived  only  a  couple  of  years  longer, 


60       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

dying  of  the  plague,  just  one  month  after  Zwingli, 
in  November,  1531.  Although  he  was  so  modest 
and  his  name  meant  only  "the  light  of  the  house," 
yet  Ecolampadius  became  "a  burning  and  shining 
light,"  like  John  the  Baptist.  He  did  what  Erasmus 
could  not  do.  Erasmus  laid  the  egg  of  the  reforma- 
tion and  Ecolampadius  hatched  it  at  Basle.* 

Connected  with  the  reformation  at  Basle  was  a 
very  celebrated  painter,  Hans  Holbein  the  younger. 
He  came  from  Augsburg,  where  he  was  born,  to 
Basle  in  15 16,  where  he  painted  the  town-hall  and 
had  as  his  friends  Erasmus  and  the  printer  Fro- 
benius.  In  1526  he  painted  his  greatest  work,  a 
Madonna — "the  Madonna  of  the  Meier  family," 
so-called,  because  he  places  in  it,  the  burgomas- 
ter of  Basle  and  his  family.  Basle  does  not 
possess  this  famous  picture,  but  Darmstadt  and 
Dresden  both  have  what  they  claim  as  the  original 
and  it  is  very  difficult  to  decide  between  them.  He 
left  Basle  in  1533,  to  become  court-painter  of  the 
king  of  England,  and  died  there  1543.  A  number 
of  his  pictures  are  in  the  picture  gallery  at  Basle 


*His  portrait,  painted  by  Asper,  is  found  in  the  pic- 
ture gallery  at  Basle  and  a  statue  to  his  memory  stands 
at  the  entrance  to  the  cloisters  of  the  cathedral. 


Basic  and  Its  Beautiful  Cathedral.  61 

in  the  Holbein-room.  There  is  a  painting  at 
Basle  called  the  "Dance  of  Death,"  which  repre- 
sents death  coming  to  different  persons  of  differ- 
ent grades  of  society.  This  has  been  ascribed  to 
Holbein,  but  it  is  older  than  he  and  was  painted 
to  represent  the  plague  of  1312.  But,  though  he 
did  not  paint  .that  famous  picture,  he  painted  a 
"dance  of  death"  for  the  Dominicans  at  Bern,  1526. 
The  original  has  been  destroyed  and  the  picture 
exists  only  in  copies,  one  of  which  is  in  the  Basle 
museum.  It  consist  of  27  designs  and  reveals  his 
tendency  to  Protestantism.  Death  comes  as  a  skel- 
eton to  pope,  king  and  cardinal,  etc.  In  it  the  ec- 
clesiastics are  satirized,  while  the  poor  people  are 
tenderly  treated.  The  Scripture  texts  reveals  his 
Protestantism.  Thus  death  comes  to  the  cardinal 
as  he  gives  forth  a  letter  of  indulgence,  and  under 
it  are  the  words,  "Woe  to  them  which  justify  the 
wicked  for  reward  and  take  away  the  righteous- 
ness of  the  righteous  from  him."  He  represents 
devils  as  watching  for  the  pope's  soul.  He  ridi- 
cules the  papist  clergy  in  his  pictures, — their  pre- 
sumptuousness,  stupidity,  laziness  and  sensuous- 
ness.  Holbein  also  executed  designs  for  woodcuts 
for  the  famous  scenes  of  the  Bible,  which  were 
published  in  the  Zurich  Bible  of  1531. 


62       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Calvin  also  visited  Basle  (1535),  but  stayed  only 
a  short  time  under  an  assumed  name.  Here  he 
had  printed  (1536),  at  the  publishing  house  of  the 
Platters'  his  immortal  work  the  "Institutes  of  The- 
ology." This  is  the  great  Theology  of  the  reforma- 
tion and  has  exerted  more  influence  than  any  other 
book  of  that  period.  But  Calvin  soon  left  to  be- 
come the  reformer  of  Geneva.  Erasmus,  Eco- 
lampadius,  Holbein — the  three  great  men  of  Basle 
in  the  reformation.  Since  that  time,  no  very  great 
name  appears  at  Basle  until  the  Thirty  Years'  war 
in  Rudolph  Wettstein,  the  great  statesman,  who  at 
the  peace  of  Westphalia  at  the  close  of  the  Thirty 
Years'  war  (1648),  secured  the  freedom  of  Switzer- 
land from  Germany. 

During  the  eighteenth  century,  Basle  was  re- 
markable for  the  number  of  mathematicians  that 
she  gave  to  the  world,  as  Euler  and  the  Bernoullis, 
ten  of  the  latter,  all  famous.  Euler  was  also  the 
great  defender  of  Evangelical  Christianity  and 
though  he  lived  most  of  his  life  at  St.  Petersburg 
and  Berlin,  never  gave  up  his  Swiss  citizenship. 
The  greatest  mathematical  prize  of  that  time,  the 
prize  of  the  Paris  university,  was  carried  away  re- 
peatedly by  these  Basle  mathematicians  during  the 


Basic  and  Its  Beautiful  Cathedral.  63 

18th  century.  Basle  did  not,  like  Zurich  and  Ge- 
neva, fall  away  into  rationalism  in  the  18th  cen- 
tury. With  Bern,  she  continued  orthodox  and  at 
the  end  of  that  century  and  the  beginning  of  the 
19th  was  the  home  of  Pietism.  Her  Pietism  made 
her  the  birthplace  of  a  number  of  practical  Chris- 
tian activities.  Thus  the  first  Young  Men's  Chris- 
tian Association  was  started  here,  long  before 
George  Williams  started  his  in  England.  Rev. 
Mr.  Meyenrock  started  it  in  1765.  In  1825,  after 
the  death  of  its  founder,  it  was  reorganized  and 
when,  in  1833,  Rev.  Mr.  Mallet,  one  of  the  leading 
Reformed  preachers  of  Germany,  visited  Basle,  he 
carried  it  back  with  him  to  Bremen.  From  there 
it  spread  and  when  George  Williams  started  his 
association  in  London,  there  were  at  least  seven 
of  these  earlier  associations  in  Germany.  The  Y. 
M.  C.  A.  movement  in  Europe  is  a  union  of  these 
two  movements. 

Another  important  religious  institution  was 
founded  at  Basle  in  1814,  the  Basle  Missionary  So- 
ciety. Next  to  the  Netherlands  Missionary  So- 
ciety it  is  the  oldest  in  Europe,  except  the  Mora- 
vian. In  171 5,  Basle  was  in  great  danger  of  bom- 
bardment by  the  hostile  armies  in  the  Napoleonic 


64       famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

war.     Just  at  that  time,  a  minister  was  holding  a 
missionary  service  at  which  a  young  man  announc- 
ed himself  as  a  candidate  for  the  foreign  field.    A 
missionary   society  was  then   formed   as   a  thank- 
offering  to  God  for  saving  the  city  from  bombard- 
ment.   This  society  began  work  in  Russia  in  1821, 
but  was  later  compelled  to  withdraw.     Its  present 
mission  fields  are  in  Africa  (along  the  Gold  Coast 
and  the  Cameroons),   China  and  the  East  Indias. 
It  is  the  largest  of  the  continental  societies,  receiv- 
ing its  moneys  mainly  from  Switzerland  and  south- 
ern Germany.    It  reports  in  1909,  386  missionaries, 
32,800  heathen  converts  and  receipts  amounting  to 
$417,000.     Its  mission  house  is  one  of  the  most  in- 
teresting institutions  of  Basle.     This  society,  like 
the    other    Continental    missionary    societies,    does 
not  require  a  college  or  university  diploma  for  its 
missionaries,   but   generally  takes   them    from   the 
trades  and  trains  them  intellectually  and  spiritually 
for  its  work.    Its  missionaries  are  expected  to  have 
some    trade,    whether    it   be   that   of   carpenter   or 
printer,  etc.,  which  may  be  useful  in  the  work  of 
the  mission  in  heathen  lands  where  they  are  ex- 
pected to  partially   support  themselves.     The   so- 
ciety has  therefore  been  enabled  to  found  success- 


Basic  and  Its  Beautiful  Cathedral.  65 

ful  industrial  missions,  where  the  natives  are  taught 
useful  trades  as  well  as  Christianity.  Thus  they 
taught  the  Mangalese  the  art  of  weaving  and  as 
a  result  45,000  yards  of  cloth  were  woven  by  them 
in  1884.  Their  collection  of  missionary  curios  is 
very  large  and  interesting,  comprising  idols,  imple- 
ments of  war,  household  utensils  and  the  costumes 
of  the  natives  of  the  lands  where  their  missions  are 
located.  There  is  also  an  interesting  set  of  pictures 
depicting  missionary  life.  The  society  is  undenom- 
inational, but  is  controlled  by  the  Reformed  con- 
sciousness. 

Near  Basle  is  another  important  missionary  in- 
stitution at  St.  Chrischona.  While  the  former  so- 
ciety aimed  especially  at  foreign  missions,  this  em- 
phasized home  missions.  It  sent  a  number  of 
young  ministers  to  America  and  is  now  helping  to 
provide  Germany  and  Switzerland  with  city  mis- 
sionaries. There  is  also  another  similar  institution 
in  Basle,  the  Preachers'  Seminary,  which  for  many 
years  has  raised  up  Evangelical  ministers  and  city 
missionaries. 

The  present  condition  of  the  Reformed  Church 
at  Basle  is  not  so  satisfactory  as  a  century  ago 
when    it    was    filled    with    Pietism.         Rationalism 


66      Fatuous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

gained  a  foothold  here  by  the  coming  of  DeWette 
as  professor  in  the  university  in  1821.  Since  that 
time,  rationalism  has  come  in  like  a  flood  and  gain- 
ed control  of  the  university,  although  there  are  still 
some  prominent  professors  of  theology  there  who 
are  Evangelical,  as  Professors  Riggenbach  and 
Orelli,  the  noted  Old  Testament  scholar.  The  lat- 
ter is  president  of  the  Swiss  Evangelical  Union, 
which  is  composed  of  all  the  Evangelical  Churches 
of  Switzerland.  Switzerland  has  as  many  Protes- 
tant denominations  as  it  has  Protestant  cantons. 
And  the  orthodox  men  in  each  of  them  belong  to 
this  Union.  It  meets  annually  in  the  spring.  The 
late  Prof.  Rudolph  Stahelin,  the  author  of  the  best 
life  of  Zwingli  (in  German)  was  a  professor  there. 
Recently  a  strong  movement  has  developed  in 
Basle  toward  separation  of  church  and  state,  strong- 
er than  in  any  of  the  German  cantons,  which  have 
always  been  unfriendly  to  such  disestablishment. 
The  great  problem  in  the  case,  is  what  to  do  with 
the  theological  department  of  the  university,  if  dis- 
establishment should  take  place.  Time  will  tell  the 
result.* 


*For    a    description    of    Schaffhausen    see    Chapter   6 
of  this  book,  on  The  Grisons  and  the  Rhine  Valley. 


Chapter     V.— BERN,     THE     CAPITAL     OF 
SWITZERLAND. 

OF  the  larger  cities  of  Switzerland,  Bern  is 
perhaps  the  most  picturesquely  located. 
For  it  stands  on  a  bluff,  whose  steep 
banks,  on  three  sides,  descend  into  the  swift  river 
Aare,  which  flows  around  it  in  a  gorge  about  a  hun- 
dred feet  below  it.  Bern  is  the  quaintest  of  the 
larger  cities  of  Switzerland,  having  more  medieval 
features  than  any  other.  This  is  due  largely  to  its 
arcades  or  covered  sidewalks,  the  second  stories  of 
the  buildings  projecting  over  the  pavements.  This, 
it  is  true,  makes  the  stores  dark,  but  it  protects  the 
pavements  from  rain  and  cold  and  makes  it  delight- 
fully cool  for  promenading  on  a  hot  summer  day. 
Bern  has  a  population  of  75,000.  The  most  promi- 
nent building  is  the  cathedral  with  its  terrace  over- 
looking the  river,  from  which  there  is  a  magnificent 
view  of  the  distant  Bernese  Alps,  of  which  the 
Yungfrau  is  the  crown.  This  cathedral  was  begun 
in  1 42 1  and  completed  in  1598,  later  restored  in 
1850.  But  it  was  not  till  about  twenty  years  ago 
that  its  tower  was  crowned  with  a  beautiful  grace- 
69 


jo      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

ful  spire,  328  feet  high.  The  cathedral  is  285  feet 
long  and  118  feet  broad. 

To  this  town  Zwingli  came  as  a  boy  of  13  from 
Basle,  to  continue  his  education.  Here  he  probab- 
ly gained  his  first  impulse  toward  the  freer  learn- 
ing. For  here  a  schoolmaster,  named  Lupulus, 
taught  according  to  the  new  methods  of 'Humanism, 
which  was  a  revival  of  learning  in  the  16th  cen- 
tury. But  unfortunately,  his  studies  were  cut  short 
by  the  attempt  of  the  Dominicans,  who,  seeing  his 
abilities  especially  in  music,  attempted  to  make  a 
monk  of  him.  His  father,  who  was  not  friendly 
to  the  monks,  took  him  home  so  as  to  get  him  away 
from  them  and  sent  him  to  the  university  of  Vi- 
enna. But  it  is  interesting  to  think,  how  if  he  had 
become  a  monk,  he  would  have  begun  the  reforma- 
tion like  Luther,  who  was  a  monk.  As  it  is,  he 
grew  up  with  the  larger  vision  of  the  scholar,  and 
the  more  practical  methods  of  the  parish  priest  and 
from  that  standpoint  began  the  reformation. 

When  the  reformation  had  broken  out  at  Zurich, 
it  gradually  began  to  influence  Bern.  The  leading 
priest  at  Bern  was  Berthold  Haller,  not  as  great  a 
man  as  either  Zwingli  or  Ecolampadius,  but  he  is 
an  illustration  of  an  ordinary  man  becoming  great 


Bern,  the  Capital  of  Switzerland.  yi 

by  making  use  of  his  opportunities  at  a  critical 
time.  The  reformation  grew  with  many  reverses 
at  Bern,  until  in  January,  1528,  a  great  conference 
was  held  there  in  the  Franciscan  Church.  To  it 
came  many  distinguished  strangers  from  other  can- 
tons ;  yes,  even  from  western  Germany,  came  Bucer 
and  Capito.  -At  this  conference,  Zwingli  appeared  as 
the  leader.  The  doctrines  of  the  papacy  were  dis- 
cussed, and  a  very  remarkable  circumstance  occur- 
red during  its  session.  Zwingli  was  preaching  on 
one  of  the  clauses  of  the  Apostles'  Creed  when  a 
priest,  robed  in  his  vestments,  came  into  the  church 
to  celebrate  mass  at  one  of  the  side  altars.  But 
Zwingli  preached  with  such  eloquence,  that  the 
priest's  mind  was  riveted  and  he  lost  faith  in  his 
old  doctrines.  So,  in  the  presence  of  the  assembled 
congregation,  he  stripped  himself  of  his  robes  and 
throwing  them  aside  on  the  altar,  he  exclaimed : 
"Unless  the  mass  reposes  on  a  more  solid  founda- 
tion, I  can  celebrate  it  no  longer."  His  conversion 
to  Protestantism  produced  a  great  sensation.  The 
conference  resulted  favorably  to  the  reformers.  As 
a  result,  the  great  central  canton  of  Bern  now  threw 
its  fortunes  with  the  Reformed. 

This  was  the  most  important  event  that  had  yet 


72      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

happened  in  Switzerland  since  the  reformation 
began.  For  Bern  was  not  only  the  central  canton 
but  the  largest,  so  large  that  two  centuries  after, 
two  cantons,  Aargau  and  Vaud,  could  be  carved 
out  of  it  and  still  leave  it  a  respectable  canton  in 
size.  But  its  influence  for  Protestantism  became 
still  more  important  outside  of  itself.  For  it  led 
to  the  opening  up  to  the  Gospel  of  French  or 
southern  Switzerland,  which  as  yet  had  been  un- 
touched by  it.  Soon  after  this  Bern  acquired  the 
region  lying  north  of  Lake  Geneva  from  the  duke 
of  Savoy  and  by  her  league  with  Geneva  she  ex- 
erted so  great  an  influence,  that  that  whole  south- 
ern district  of  Neuchatel,  Geneva  and  now  Vaud 
was  thrown  open  to  the  Gospel. 

Bern  had  no  head  minister  named  antistes  like 
Zurich  or  Basle.  She  had  superintendents  over  dis- 
tricts, who  were  called  dekans  and  the  dekan  at  the 
cathedral  at  Bern  was  the  head-dekan  of  the  Can- 
ton. As  Bern  had  no  university  no  very  prominent 
persons  appeared.  But  at  the  close  of  the  seven- 
teenth century,  the  church  had  fallen  into  a  sort 
of  dead  orthodoxy  and  a  wave  of  Pietism  appear- 
ed. The  early  Pietists  as  Guldin  and  Konig,  were 
compelled  to  leave,  but  Pietism  remained  in  the 


Bern,  the  Capital  of  Switzerland.  73 

church  and  found  a  prominent  leader  among  the 
ministers  in  Rev.  Samuel  Lutz,  or  as  he  latinized 
himself  in  his  work  "Lucius."  He  was  pastor  at 
Amsoldingen  south  of  Thun,  and  held  great  open- 
air  meetings  in  his  parish.  Indeed  the  whole  re- 
gion from  Thun  to  Interlaken  had  many  pietists 
who  desired  more  religious  life  in  the  church  and 
more  religious  experience  in  the  individual  Chris- 
tian. 

No  great  name,  however,  appeared  in  Bern  until 
in  the  18th  century,  that  century  of  rationalism, 
when  there  arose  a  great  opponent  to  rationalism 
and  defender  of  Christianity  in  Albert  von  Haller, 
'one  of  the  most  remarkable  men  Switzerland  has 
produced.  He  was  born  October  8,  1708,  at  Bern. 
He  soon  revealed  remarkable  ability,  especially  in 
the  languages,  so  that  at  nine  years  of  age,  he  read 
the  New  Testament  in  Greek,  and  was  learning 
Hebrew.  He  intended  to  become  a  minister,  but 
after  the  death  of  his  father,  he  was  influenced  by 
a  physician  Neuhaus  to  change  to  medicine.  Hav- 
ing finished  his  studies  at  Bern,  he  went  at  the  age 
of  fifteen  to  the  university  of  Tubingen  in  Ger- 
many. Then  he  went  to  the  university  of  Leyden, 
where  he  received  the  doctor's  degree.     There  he 


74      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

sat  at  the  feet  of  Prof.  Boerhave,  the  great  pro- 
fessor of  medicine,  who,  like  him,  was  providen- 
tially kept  out  of  the  ministry  for  great  purposes. 
For  Haller,  like  Boerhave,  was  destined  to  exert 
a  wider  influence  for  religion  out  of  the  ministry, 
than  if  he  had  been  in  it. 

On  his  return  to  Switzerland,  he  became  famous 
for  his  poems,  for  he  was  the  first  poet  of  nature 
that  Switzerland  had  produced.  "The  Alps"  was 
his  most  famous  poem.  His  fame  as  a  scientist  led 
him  to  be  called  to  the  university  of  Gottingen,  in 
Germany,  in  1736.  There  he  taught  the  sciences 
till  1753,  when  he  returned  to  Bern,  where  he 
filled  several  positions  in  the  government.  But  it' 
was  as  a  Christian  that  Haller  stands  out  promi- 
nently. In  an  age,  when  rationalism  was  prevalent, 
Haller  was  outspoken  for  Christianity,  and  the 
fact  that  he  was  a  layman  and  a  scientist,  added 
force  to  his  testimony.  His  most  important  de- 
fence were  his  "Letters  about  the  most  important 
Truths  of  Revelation,"  published  1772.  He  was  the 
strong  opponent  of  the  bald  materialism  of  Voltaire 
and  La  Mettrie,  the  latter  having  written  "Man  as 
a  Machine."  Haller  declared  that  the  Bible  was 
his  whole  theology,  and  so  greatly  did  he  love  his 


Bern,  the  Capital  of  Szvitserland.  75 

own  church,  that  he  was  instrumental  in  the  found- 
ing of  a  Reformed  Church  at  Gottingen,  which  was 
located  in  a  Lutheran  land.  He  died,  calling  on 
God  to  receive  his  soul,  December  12,  1777.  If 
Switzerland  had  a  Voltaire  at  that  time  at  Geneva, 
she  also  had  a  Haller  at  Bern  to  defend  the  old 
faith. 

Bern  remained  faithful  to  the  old  orthodoxy 
until  about  1830,  when  with  the  new  liberal  politi- 
cal party,  as  in  Zurich,  there  came  in  a  new  ration- 
alism. A  university  was  founded  at  Bern  just  as 
there  had  been  at  Zurich  and  a  rationalistic  pro- 
fessor of  theology  was  called  (1846)  in  Edward 
Zeller,  the  Hegelian.  Protests  were  lifted  against 
this  and  there  was  a  controversy  as  in  Zurich.  But, 
unlike  Strauss,  who  did  not  come  to  Zurich,  Zeller 
came  to  Bern  and  taught  for  a  short  time.  But  he 
did  not  find  his  position  very  comfortable  and  soon 
went  back  to  Germany.  Thus  Bern  at  last  received 
rationalism  and  it  grew  in  influence  until  now  al- 
most all  of  the  professors  of  theology  at  the  uni- 
versity, except  Prof.  Barth  and  the  private-docent 
Lauterberg,  do  not  belong  to  the  evangelical 
wing.  However,  to  offset  the  entrance  of  ration- 
alism,   a   large,    active   and   influential    Evangelical 


j6      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Society  has  been  formed  in  the  canton,  which,  when 
it  has  its  annual  conference  in  Bern,  draws  thou- 
sands to  its  sessions.  And  we  understand  that  the 
younger  ministers  are  prevailingly  Evangelical, 
which  is  hopeful.  One  of  the  leading  preachers  is 
Rev.  Mr.  Hadorn  at  the  cathedral  in  Bern,  the 
author  of  several  important  works  of  Swiss  reli- 
gious history. 

Bern,  while  interesting  religiously,  is  also  inter- 
esting politically.  As  the  capital  of  Switzerland, 
it  contains  the  Federal  Palace,  where  the  congress 
and  house  of  representatives  meet,  which  is  finely 
located  on  the  east  side  of  the  city,  above  the  gorge 
of  the  river,  and  commanding  a  fine  view  of  the 
distant  Bernese  Alps.  Switzerland  is  composed  of  22 
cantons  or  states.  Three  languages  are  used  in  the 
sessions  of  the  congress  and  house  of  representa- 
tives, German,  French  and  Italian.  Its  upper  house 
has  two  representatives  from  each  canton ;  its  lower 
house  has  about  150  members.  Switzerland  is  there- 
fore like  the  United  States  in  miniature,  or  rather 
the  United  States  is  an  enlargement  of  Switzerland, 
or  as  we  shall  see  when  we  come  to  visit  Geneva, 
Switzerland  is  the  United  States  of  Europe.  Be- 
cause it  is  the  capital,  it  has  a  number  of  national 


Bern,  the  Capital  of  Switzerland.  jj 

institutions  as  the  Historical  Museum,  devoted  to 
the  history  of  all  Switzerland.  In  addition  to  its 
importance  as  the  capital  of  Switzerland,  Bern  is 
also  the  seat  of  various  international  movements, 
which  have  been  located  in  Switzerland,  because  it 
is  neutral  ground  between  the  great  nations.  Thus 
the  International  Postal  Union  was  founded  in 
1874  and  its  centre  was  located  at  Bern.  Bern  is 
also  interesting  in  itself.  It  is  a  great  city — for 
bears, — the  bear  being  the  emblem  of  the  canton. 
If  all  the  bears  in  Bern  were  alive,  it  would  not  be 
healthy  to  stay  there,  but  they  are  not.  There  are 
wooden  bears,  bronze  bears,  stone  bears,  while  at 
one  place  Bruin  appears  in  statue  clothed  with 
sword,  hammer  and  helmet.  And  there  are  even  live 
bears,  but  the  latter  are  kept  safe  from  harm  in  a 
bear-pit  at  the  east  end  of  the  town.  Yet  so  great 
was  the  veneration  of  the  Bernese  for  these  live 
bears,  that  the  taking  of  them  away  by  a  hostile 
power  on  one  occasion  almost  resulted  in  a  war. 
Bern  without  its  bears  would  not  be  Bern  any  more, 
for  the  bear  is  Bern's  tutelary  deity.  Perhaps  the 
most  remarkable  curiosity  is  the  bear-clock,  located 
at  what  was  formerly  the  west-gate  of  the  city,  but 
is  now  in  the  heart  of  the  city.    Every  hour  a  pro- 


78       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

cession  of  bears  take  place  in  front  of  this  clock. 
First  a  rooster,  made  to  crow  by  machinery,  crows, 
and  when  we  first  heard  him,  his  voice  was  as  husky 
as  if  he  had  contracted  a  dozen  pneumonias  with 
perhaps  tuberculosis  thrown  in.  He  has  evidently 
died  or  something  else  has  happened  to  him,  for 
the  rooster  that  now  crows  is  in  better  voice, — 
perhaps  he  has  been  taking  music  lessons  from 
some  great  singer,  who  knows?  When  he  has 
delivered  himself  of  his  crow,  then  the  wooden 
bears,  some  of  them  standing,  some  of  them  on  all 
fours,  march  around  a  seated  figure  and  a  harle- 
quin strikes  the  hour.  The  rooster  again  crows,  the 
old  man  turns  the  hour-glass  to  show  that  a  new 
hour  has  begun,  while  a  bear  at  his  side  most  ri- 
diculously jerks  his  head,  now  to  the  right  and  then 
to  the  left.  The  whole  performance  is  ended  by 
the  rooster  crowing  the  third  time.  Another  quaint 
curiosity  is  the  child-eater,  a  statue  of  a  man,  who 
is  in  the  act  of  eating  children.  He  has  them  in 
his  pockets  and  is  about  putting  one  in  his  mouth 
to  eat.  The  statue  is  used  to  frighten  the  children 
into  obedience.  Whether  it  does  so  or  not,  we  do 
not  know,  but  it  would  take  more  than  that  to  make 
young  America  obedient. 


Chapter  VI.— THE  GRISOXS  AND  THE 
SWISS  RHINE. 

THE  Rhine,  the  beautiful  Rhine ;  but  Swit- 
zerland has  its  Rhine  as  well  as  Germany. 
It  has  the  source  of  the  Rhine  in  its  can- 
ton of  the  Grisons.  This  is  the  great  eastern  can- 
ton of  Switzerland,  the  largest  in  size,  but  one  of 
the  smallest  in  population,  for  its  elevation  is  too 
high  to  support  many  people.  It  has  more  Alps 
and  grand  mountain  scenery  than  almost  any  other 
part  of  Switzerland,  and  it  has  a  mountain  that  for 
beauty  rivals  if  not  exceeds  the  famous  Vung-frau, 
the  Pitz  Palu  near  Pontresina.  It  contains  the 
grandest  of  the  Swiss  passes,  the  Splugen  whose 
northern  entrance,  the  Via  Mala  at  Thusis,  is  the 
grandest  entrance  to  any  of  the  Swiss  mountain 
passes.  While  further  east  is  the  beautiful  Enga- 
dine  valley,  a  valley  high  enough  to  be  on  the 
tops  of  the  hills,  for  the  altitude  of  the  bottom  of 
the  valley  is  from  3,000  to  6,000  feet  above  sea 
level.  And  yet  it  is  surrounded  on  both  sides  by 
high  mountain  peaks,  that  rise  like  gothic  cathedral 
spires  from  10,000  to  14.000  feet  above  sea-level 
around  it.     It  is  the  finest  large  upper  valley  in  the 

79 


8o      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

country,  and  has  a  delightful  climate  in  summer  and 
a  wonderful  growth  of  wild  Alpine  flowers.  Still 
another  peculiarity  of  the  valley  is  its  use  of  the 
Romansch  language  by  thousands  of  its  people,  the 
fourth  language  spoken  in  Switzerland. 

Into  this  eastern  canton  of  Switzerland,  the  doc- 
trines of  the  reformation  began  to  enter  early. 
Zwingli  had  a  warm  friend  and  adherent  in  Com- 
ander  at  Chur,  the  capital  of  the  canton.  The  re- 
sult was  that  Chur  and  the  Prattigau  district  to 
the  east  became  largely  Reformed,  while  to  the  west 
the  Upper-Alp  valley  remained  Catholic.  Long 
before  the  Pilgrim  Fathers  brought  religious  and 
civil  liberty  to  America  in  the  Mayflower,  as  they 
boast,  the  Catholics  and  Protestants  of  this  canton 
had  established  the  first  religious  liberty.  While 
elsewhere  the  Catholics  persecuted  Protestants  and 
Protestants  hated  Catholics,  here  at  Ilanz  on  June 
25,  1526,  Catholics  and  Protestants  agreed  to  re- 
spect each  others  views  and  live  in  peace  with  each 
other.  This  religious  liberty  would  have  continued 
to  the  present  day,  if  foreign  powers  had  not,  as 
we  shall  see,  involved  them  in  internal  strife  and 
foreign  war. 

A  very  interesting  episode  in  the  introduction  of 


The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  81 

the  Protestant  doctrines  occurred  at  Pontresina  in 
the  Engadine.  The  little  village  church  there  was 
without  a  pastor,  when  Yergerius,  one  of  the  Ital- 
ian reformers,  happened  to  pass  through  it.  When 
the  villagers  learned  that  he  was  a  priest,  they 
asked  him  to  remain  and  be  their  priest.  He  re- 
plied that  perhaps  they  might  not  like  his  doctrine. 
But  simple-hearted  as  they  were,  they  declared  that 
they  would  be  satisfied  with  it,  whatever  it  might 
be.  It  was  not  long  before  his  preaching  began  to 
bear  fruit.  The  congregation  felt  that  the  use  of 
images  in  the  church  was  idolatry.  They  deter- 
mined to  put  them  away.  But  what  to  do  with 
them  was  the  question.  Some  of  the  congregation 
suggested  that  they  be  sold  to  the  churches  lower 
down  the  valley,  which  still  believed  in  Catholic 
images.  Others,  however,  declared  that  if  images 
were  wrong  in  their  church,  it  would  be  wrong  to 
put  them  into  the  hands  of  their  neighbors  to  be 
worshipped.  So,  finally  they  took  the  images  to 
the  little  stream,  that  flows  past  Pontresina,  threw 
them  into  its  rushing  waters,  and  that  was  the  end 
of  Catholicism  in  the  Engadine.  The  Reformed 
faith  was  then  introduced  into  many  parts  of  the 
canton. 


82      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

The  Thirty  Years  war,  that  awful  war  of  Eu- 
rope, brought  devastation  to  the  Engadine,  al- 
though it  hardly  touched  any  other  part  of  Swit- 
zerland. But  unfortunately  this  canton  was  strong 
in  military  strategical  points.  It  had  the  most  di- 
rect pass  between  Germany  and  Italy,  the  Splugen. 
The  possession  of  this  pass  was  coveted  by  three 
great  nations,  Spain,  Austria  and  France.  Besides 
this,  Austria  laid  some  claim  to  a  sort  of  sover- 
eignty over  a  part  of  the  canton  and  she  sent  armies 
into  it  to  make  good  her  claim.  Then,  too,  there 
were  two  parties  within  the  canton,  the  Catholic 
and  Protestant,  the  first  led  by  the  Plantas,  the  last 
by  Von  Salis  and  Jenatsch.  First  the  Protestants 
took  severe  measures  against  the  Catholics.  This 
led  the  Catholics  to  retaliate  by  a  severe  massacre, 
a  second  St.  Bartholomew's  massacre,  though  small- 
er, in  the  Valtellina  valley,  now  in  Italy,  but  then 
included  in  the  canton.  This  valley  runs  east  and 
west,  ending  to  the  west  in  the  upper  end  of  beauti- 
ful Lake  Como,  the  most  beautiful  of  the  Italian 
lakes. 

The  fearful  massacre  of  the  Protestants  began 
July  19,  1620,  at  Tirano,  where  the  head  of  the 
Reformed  pastor  on  a  spike  was  exposed  in  his 


The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  83 

pulpit  as  a  warning  against  heretics.  Farther 
down  the  valley  was  Teglio,  where  the  Reformed 
had  gathered  for  prayer  in  their  little  church.  The 
enemy  fired  in  the  window,  wounding  the  pastor 
while  leading  in  prayer.  And  when  those  who 
were  not  killed  in  the  church,  fled  to  the  church- 
tower,  the  Catholics  set  the  tower  on  fire  and  burn- 
ed them  all  up  in  an  awful  holocaust.  At  Sondrio, 
further  down  the  valley,  the  Reformed,  hearing  of 
the  danger,  united  and  marched  armed  through 
the  city.  Most  of  them  contrived  to  escape  over  the 
Malenco  valley  into  the  Engadine.  But  in  all,  about 
500  Reformed  were  killed,  among  them  eight  min- 
isters. 

After  this  massacre  Austria,  invited  by  the  Cath- 
olic party  in  the  canton,  sent  her  army  there  with 
fearful  results  to  the  Reformed.  The  Reformed 
pastors  were  driven  out  and  supplanted  by  Capuchin 
monks.  The  Reformed  people  were  forced  to  go 
to  the  Catholic  Church  by  the  soldiers  and  their 
children  forced  to  attend  Catholic  schools.  The 
oppressions  of  the  soldiers  became  so  severe  that 
many  fled  to  the  woods  and  wilds  and  lived  on  roots 
and  berries,  where  they  were  secretly  ministered  to 
by  Reformed  ministers.     Finally,  in  1621,  their  op- 


84       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

pressions  became  so  terrible  that  they  rose  against 
the  invaders  and  drove  them  out,  killing  the  leader 
of  the  Capuchins,  Father  Fidelis.  But  it  availed 
nothing,  for  Austria  only  sent  another  and  a 
stronger  army  into  the  canton  to  reduce  them  to 
greater  extremities.  The  condition  of  the  Re- 
formed was  at  the  lowest  ebb,  for  they  had  hardly 
any  pastors  and  many  of  their  members  had  emi- 
grated. 

Finally  France,  although  a  Catholic  power,  came 
to  their  assistance,  because  she  was  jealous  of  the 
growing  power  of  Austria  and  Spain,  and  wanted 
to  check  it.  She  sent  in  1635  as  their  governor,  the 
great  Huguenot  general,  Duke  Henry  of  Rohan, 
"the  good  duke,"  as  he  was  affectionately  called 
by  the  people.  He  had  been  compelled  to  flee  from 
France  for  the  sake  of  his  faith.  He  relieved  their 
distresses.  The  canton  had  peace  and  the  Reform- 
ed Church  again  revived.  But  as  he  did  not  re- 
conquer the  Valtellina  valley  in  the  south  (which 
he  could  not  do  as  France  did  not  support  him  in 
it)  the  people  finally  became  dissatisfied  with  the 
French  control  and  rose  against  it  in  1639.  Dur- 
ing this  time  the  Reformed  regained  many  of  their 
churches    and    their    faith    was    firmly    established 


The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  85 

again.  But  they  never  forgot  these  persecutions 
of  the  Catholics,  for  even  in  the  latter  part  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  when  a  Catholic  chapel  was  al- 
lowed to  be  built  at  St.  Moritz  in  the  Engadine, 
now  a  very  fashionable  watering-place,  there  were 
a  good  many  murmurs  of  discontent  among  the 
Romansch  people,  who  shook  their  heads  with 
doubt  and  fear  at  the  return  of  the  Catholics. 

It  is  interesting  to  notice  that  along  the  southern 
border  of  the  canton,  in  the  Yal  Bregaglia  as  at 
Vico  Soprano  and  in  the  Bernina  pass  as  at  Pos- 
chiavo,  there  are  still  six  Reformed  congregations 
who  use  the  Italian  language,— the  small  remnant 
of  the  Italian  Reformed,  who  were  so  fearfully  per- 
secuted in  the  Valtellina  massacre.     Still  the  early 
liberality  of  the  people  of  this  canton  on  religious 
liberty,  as  shown  in  1526,  still  exists  in  the  canton, 
for  we  were  told  some  years  ago  by  the  pastor  of 
the  Italian  Reformed  Church  at  Poschiavo  that  the 
Reformed  synod  of  the  Grisons  met  in  his  town  a 
few  years  before.     And  they  were  entertained,  not 
by  the  Reformed,  but  by  the  town,  of  which  perhaps 
four-fifths   were    Catholics,    which    showed   that   a 
very  kindly  feeling  had  taken  the  place  of  the  bit- 
ter hatred  of  three  centuries  ago. 


86      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Leaving  Chur  and  the  source  of  the  Rhine,  we 
follow  it  northward,  past  the  canton  of  Appenzell, 
and  St.  Gall  on  the  west,  both  places  famous  for 
the  making  of  their  exquisite  Swiss  embroideries. 
The  canton  of  Appenzell  was  greatly  divided  in  the 
time  of  the  reformation  and  there  was  considerable 
friction.  But  it  happened  that  it  was  divided  main- 
ly along  geographical  lines.  The  mountaineers 
around  Mt.  Sentis  on  the  south  remained  Catholics, 
while  the  farming  people  northward  toward  Ger- 
many received  the  new  doctrine  of  the  reformation. 
They  finally  very  wisely  agreed  to  divide  the  can- 
ton in  1597,  into  two  half-cantons,  Inner-Rhoden 
being  Catholic  and  Outer-Rhoden  being  Protestant. 
They  were  always  at  daggers  points  politically  in 
the  Swiss  diet,  and  the  vote  of  the  one  neutralized 
the  vote  of  the  other,  but  still  they  had  peace  be- 
tween them  ever  since. 

St.  Gall  is  a  city,  not  a  canton,  but  one  of  the 
largest  cities  of  high  altitude  in  Europe,  its  alti- 
tude being  2,200  feet  above  sea-level,  and  its  pop- 
ulation 5,000.  The  city  grew  up  around  the  abbey, 
which  had  been  planted  there  by  Gallus  the  mis- 
sionary from  the  British  Isles  in  the  seventh  cen- 
tury.       Gallus   had   introduced   the   British   faith, 


The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  87 

which  was  simpler  and  more  like  the  Protestant 
than  the  Romish,  and  that  region  never  got  over  it, 
for  as  we  have  seen  in  Zwingli's  boyhood,  the  peo- 
ple were  fond  of  the  Bible  and  its  stories,  and 
Zwingli  was  told  them  by  his  mother  in  boyhood. 
But  the  Romish  faith  overcame  the  British  and  the 
ritual  of  the  abbey  became  very  ornate.  The  abbey 
became  famous  for  its  wealth  and  its  library,  which 
now  contains  30,000  volumes,  some  of  them  very 
rare  books  and  manuscripts. 

But,  although  Catholicism  had  so  strong  a  citadel 
there,  the  Reformed  doctrines  early  gained  an  en- 
trance in  the  reformation.  It  happened  that  one  of 
Zwingli's  schoolmates  at  the  University  of  Vienna 
was  Joachim  Vadian  (von  Watt)  who  was  from 
St.  Gall.  After  residing  at  Vienna,  where  he  was 
made  rector  of  the  university  for  a  number  of  years, 
he  returned  to  St.  Gall  as  a  physician  and  was  made 
mayor  of  the  city  in  1526,  just  as  the  reformation 
had  gained  control  at  Zurich.  Feeling  the  need 
of  a  reformation  in  the  Catholic  Church,  he  intro- 
duced the  new  doctrines  from  Zurich  into  St.  Gall. 
In  this,  he  was  assisted  by  another  layman,  John 
Kessler,  a  saddler,  who  had  studied  under  Luther 
and  Melancthon  at  Wittenberg,  and  who  preached 


88      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

very  eloquently.  By  1528,  the  council  of  the  city 
had  ordered  all  images  out  of  the  churches  and  in 
1529  a  large  synod  was  held  there,  attended  by 
many  pastors  of  neighboring  cantons.  Of  course 
all  this  time  the  abbot  of  the  abbey,  which  is  sep- 
arated from  the  city  only  by  a  narrow  street,  looked 
en  with  great  hostility,  for  the  reformation  was 
robbing  him  of  his  constituents.  After  the  unfor- 
tunate defeat  of  Zurich  in  the  Second  Cappel  war 
(1531),  when  Zwingli  was  killed,  there  came  a 
strong  Catholic  reaction  in  Switzerland  and  many 
were  the  brushes  between  the  abbey  and  the  citi- 
zens. When  the  Catholics  of  the  abbey  thought 
themselves  strong  enough,  they  would  march  in 
grand  processions  through  the  streets  of  the  city. 
And  then  the  Protestants  would  close  the  gates  of 
the  city  against  them  in  order  to  stop  these  pro- 
cessions, in  a  Protestant  city.  But  to-day  Protestant 
and  Catholic,  abbey  and  city,  live  side  by  side  in 
peace.  However,  the  founder  of  this  Reformed 
Church,  Vadian,  was  a  remarkable  illustration  of 
a  prominent  Christian  layman  in  reformation  times. 
He  was  not  only  a  physician  but  also  a  great  scien- 
tist, especially  in  geography. 

Following  the  Rhine  northward  as  it  passes  into 


The  Orisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine  89 

the  quiet  lake  of  Constance,  we  pass  the  city  of 
Constance  on  the  northwest  side  of  the  lake,  but 
in   Germany.     There  at  the  council  of   Constance 
John   Huss,   the   reformer  before   the   reformation 
was  condemned  and  burned  at  the  council  of  Con- 
stance  (1414-8),  one  of  the  three  great  reforming 
councils  of  the  Catholic  Church  in  the  Middle  Ages. 
In   its  cathedral,  he  was   condemned  and   a   large 
stone  slab,  with  a  white  mark  on  it  is  said  to  mark 
the  spot.     A  large  boulder  to  the  west  of  the  town 
in   the   Bruehl.  marks  the  spot  where  he  suffered 
martyrdom   July   6,    1415.      The   Dominican   mon- 
astery, where  he  was  imprisoned,  is  now  turned  into 
the  fine  Island  Hotel.    Huss  was  the  prophet  of  the 
coming   reformation,   and   he    foretold   its   coming. 
The  Rhine  now  flows  westward  so  as  to  get  around 
the  mountains  of  the   Black  Forest.     Passing  the 
canton  of  Thurgau  to  the  south,  which  is  mainly 
Reformed,  it  next  flows  by  the  city  of  Schaffhausen. 
A   mile  and  a  half  below  that  city  is  the  famous 
Falls  of  the  Rhine,  the  "Niagara  Falls"  of  Europe, 
not  so  grand  by  any  means  as  our  Niagara,  but  still 
very  picturesque.     The  falls  are  about  60  feet  high 
and  375  feet  wide,  only  about  one-half  as  high  as 
Niagara,   and   one-tenth   as   broad.     And   yet   this 


90      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

majestically  flowing  river  (for  by  this  time  the  lit- 
tle brawling  stream  of  the  Grisons  has  become  a 
broad  river  as  the  waters  of  Lake  Constance  flow 
out  through  it)  makes  a  magnificent  fall.  And 
when  it  is  illuminated  at  night  by  electric  lights  of 
many  colors,  it  becomes  a  vision  of  beauty  as  well 
as  of  majesty.  As  one  looks  out  across  the  falls 
to  Switzerland,  the  falls  seem  to  be  set  in  a  beau- 
tiful frame  of  distant  snow-capped  Alps. 

Schauffhausen  is  a  quaint  old  Swiss  town  of 
16,000.  Many  of  its  buildings  bear  inscriptions, — 
two  or  three  of  them  hundreds  of  years  old.  The 
city  hall  and  the  knight's  house  are  especially  in- 
teresting, because  of  their  antiqueness.  In  the 
cathedral  is  shown  the  bell,  whose  inscription  gave 
Schiller,  the  great  German  poet,  the  suggestion  for 
his  famous  poem  "The  Song  of  the  Bell."  The  in- 
scription reads  "vivos-  voco,"  "mortuos  plango," 
"fulgura  frango"  (I  call  the  living,  I  lament  the 
dead,  I  check  the  lightnings). 

The  doctrines  of  the  reformation  were  intro- 
duced into  Schaffhausen  by  Sebastian  Hoffmeister 
in  1522.  In  April,  1523,  he  wrote  to  Zwingli :  "By 
us  is  Christ  received  with  great  avidity.  I  preach 
with  good  results.     The  council  has  promised  me 


The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  91 

protection  against  the  pope."     The  Catholics  be- 
came alarmed  at  the  progress  of  the  reformation, 
and  called  to  their  assistance  a  prominent  preacher, 
Erasmus  Ritter,  who  preached  against  Protestant- 
ism with  great  power ;  when,  lo,  a  miracle,  the  Saul 
becomes  a  Paul,— Ritter  becomes  a  Protestant.    But 
still  the  city  was  greatly  divided  between  the  old 
and  the  new  faith,  the  guilds  of  the  fishers  and  the 
vintners  being  for  the  reformation,  and  the  other 
g-uilds  against  it.    A  reaction  took  place  and  it  look- 
ed  as  if  the  reformation  would  be  checked  here  as 
it  had  been  at  Lucerne.    Hoffmeister  was  compelled 
to  resign,  but  Ritter  remained  to  preach  the  truth 
with  great  prudence.    The  victory  of  the  Reformed 
at  the  conference  at  Bern  in  January,  1528,  greatly 
affected  Schaffhausen  and  a  Protestant  mayor  was 
elected  in  1529.     From  that  day  Schaffhausen  has 
been  firm  in  its  attachment  to  the  Reformed  faith. 
But,  lying  as  she  did  on  the  borders  of  Switzer- 
land, she  had  yet  to  pass  through  many  dangers 
for  it.    The  Thirty  Years  war,  which  so  terribly  de- 
vastated Germany,  put  her  into  danger.     She  es- 
caped the  war,  but  she  received  the  war's  awful  re- 
sult, the  plague.     However,  that  war  in  Germany 
brought  to  her  also  blessings.     It  drove  many  Re- 


92       Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

formed  ministers  out  of  Heidelberg  and  the  Pala- 
tinate, some  of  whom  as  Fabricius,  the  father  of 
Prof.  J.  L.  Fabricius  of  Heidelberg  University, 
came  to  Schaffhausen  as  an  asylum  and  taught 
there.  These  refugee  ministers  spoke  so  highly  of 
the  Heidelberg  catechism,  which  had  been  used  in 
the  Reformed  Churches  of  the  Palatinate,  that  the 
canton  of  Schaffhausen  set  aside  the  old  catechism 
of  Leo  Juda  and  has  ever  since  used  the  Heidel- 
berg. Pietism  later  appeared  in  the  Church  of 
Schaffhausen.  George  Hurter,  following  the  ex- 
ample of  Franke  at  Halle,  Germany,  founded  an 
orphan's  asylum,  which  is  still  in  existence.  Pietism 
gained  a  strong  hold  on  this  canton,  one  of  its  an- 
tistes  going  so  far  -as  to  incline  to  the  Moravians, 
Antistes  Oschwald   (1751). 

Perhaps  the  most  illustrious  character  that 
Schaffhausen  produced  was  the  great  historian  of 
Switzerland,  John  von  Muller,  sometimes  called 
"the  Tacitus  of  Switzerland."  John  Muller  was 
born  in  1752  at  Schaffhausen.  He  was  a  born  his- 
torian, for  at  the  early  age  of  nine  he  attempted  to 
write  the  history  of  his  native  city.  He  was  in- 
tended for  the  ministry,  but  after  studying  in  his 
native  town  and  then  at  the  University  of  Gottingen 


The  Orisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  93 

in  Germany,  he  decided  to  devote  his  life  to  writ- 
ing a  history  of  his  native  land,  for  which  he  began 
gathering  materials  about  1772.     He  travelled  over 
most  of  Switzerland  gathering  facts  from  original 
sources,  and  his  history  gradually  appeared.     He 
went  to  Germany,  where  the  Landgrave  of  Hesse 
appointed  him  professor  of  history  and  librarian  at 
Cassel.     There  he  wrote  his  history  of  the  Estab- 
lishment of  the  Popes  in  the  Eighth  Century.    The 
Catholics  were  surprised  that  a   Protestant  would 
write  such  a  history  and  thought  he  was  inclining 
toward  Rome.     The  Elector  of  Mayence  made  him 
librarian  at  Mayence  and  the  Catholics  tried  to  win 
him  by  sending  him  on  a  diplomatic  deputation  to 
Rome.     He  was  then  called  to  Vienna  and  every 
effort  made  to  convert  him  to   Rome,  but  without 
success.     He  then  accepted  a  call  to  Berlin  where 
he  met  Napoleon  Bonaparte,  who  greatly  admired 
him.  made  him  secretary  of  state  of  the  kingdom  of 
Westphalia.     He  died  shortly  after  (1807)  at  Cas- 
sel.    His  last  words  were,  "Whatever  is,  is  of  God 
and  all  comes  from  God."     In  his  History  of  Swit- 
zerland, which  is  a  monumental  work,  he  reveals 
immense  research  and  rare  historical  judgment  as 
well  as  great  finish  of  literary  style.  Although  often 


94      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

among  royalty,  he  never  lost  his  love  for  liberty  and 
although  often  tempted  by  Rome,  he  never  gave  up 
his  early  Reformed  faith.  His  brother  John  George 
Muller  became  a  prominent  minister  at  Schaff- 
hausen.  He  has  been  called  "The  Swiss  Herder," 
because  like  Herder,  he  bore  a  bold  testimony 
against  rationalism  and  with  a  grace  that  rivalled 
his  German  master. 

In  the  nineteenth  century  Schaffhausen  again  re- 
vealed a  revival  of  Pietism.  A  visit  of  Madame 
Krudener,  the  female  evangelist  of  the  early  part 
of  the  19th  century,  led  to  a  revival  in  the  churches 
at  Buchs,  and  Beggingen  Spliess,  a  leading  young 
minister,  attended  and  used  his  influence  for  Piet- 
ism. Later,  in  1844,  he  was  elected  antistes.  Just 
before  his  election  to  that  position,  an  unusual  thing 
for  Switzerland  happened, — the  antistes  of  Schaff- 
hausen, Hurter,  went  over  to  the  Catholic  Church. 
Frederick  Hurter  was  a  scholarly  man  and  had 
written  a  history  of  Pope  Innocent  IV.  This  and 
his  association  with  prominent  Catholics  led  him 
to  be  suspected  of  Catholic  leanings.  He  finally 
verified  these  suspicions  June  16,  1844,  by  becom- 
ing a  Catholic.  His  change  of  faith  produced  a 
great  sensation.    That  the  head  of  a  great  cantonal 


The  Grisons  and  the  Swiss  Rhine.  95 

church,  an  antistes,  should  go  over  to  Rome,  pro- 
duced a  great  sensation  as  nothing  of  the  kind  had 
happened  since  the  reformation.  The  canton  then 
elected  a  man  of  a  very  different  stamp  to  the  an- 
tistes' position,  in  Spliess  the  Pietist. 

The  Church  at  Schaffhausen  has  remained  very 
evangelical.  While  the  neighboring  cantons,  as 
Thurgau  cast  aside  the  Apostles'  Creed  as  being 
too  orthodox,  yet  Schaffhausen  clung  to  the  old 
faith,  having,  it  is  said,  not  a  rationalist  among  its 
ministers.  Her  Pietism  has  shielded  her  from 
rationalism.  And  although  a  number  of  the  Swiss 
cantons,  that  formerly  used  the  Heidelberg  cate- 
chism, as  St.  Gall,  Bern  and  the  Grisons,  have 
given  it  up,  Schaffhausen  still  retains  it.  Before 
leaving  this  interesting  city,  we  must  not  forget 
to  notice  the  Munot,  a  round  tower  155  feet  in 
diameter,  with  walls  sixteen  feet  thick.  A  winding 
incline  ascends  the  interior,  made  wide  enough  to 
take  up  a  gun-carriage.  It  is  about  80  feet  high 
and  was  begun  in  1515,  and  completed  in  1582. 
This  strong  fort,  that  has  survived  the  centuries,  is 
a  fine  type  of  steadfastness  of  Schaffhausen  to  the 
old  Evangelical  Reformed  faith  against  Romanism 
in  the  reformation  and  against  rationalism  in  the 
last  century. 


Chapter  VII.— NEUCHATEL  AND  FAREL. 

THE  three  southwestern  cantons  of  Switzer- 
land, Neuchatel,  Vaud  and  Geneva,  are 
French  and  form  an  entirely  distinct  dis- 
trict from  the  German  cantons,  which  we  have  up 
to  this  time  been  describing.  The  vivacity  of  the 
people  contrasts  strongly  with  the  more  stolid 
phlegmatic  German  of  the  northern  cantons.  But 
though  French,  they  are  Swiss-French  and  there  is 
a  firmness  about  their  nature,  lacking  in  the  pres- 
ent inhabitants  of  France.  As  many  of  them  are 
descended  from  the  Huguenots,  here  perhaps  can 
best  be  seen  the  marked  characteristics  of  that  brave 
people,  "Self-reverence,  self-knowledge,  self-con- 
trol." 

The  city  of  Neuchatel  is  finely  located  at  the  foot 
of  the  eastern  slope  of  the  Jura  mountains  on  the 
western  shore  of  the  lake  of  Neuchatel.  It  is  a 
city  of  about  25,000  inhabitants.  The  softer  green 
of  the  Jura  mountains  that  rise  up  directly  from 
the  city,  contrasts  sharply  with  the  cold  snow-white 
Alps  to  the  east.  And  often  from  Neuchatel,  when 
the  atmosphere  is  unusually  clear,  the  whole  range 

97 


98      Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

of  the  distant  Alps  from  the  Yungfrau  to  Mt.  Blanc 
can  be  clearly  seen,  making  a  superb  panorama. 

In  the  reformation  Neuchatel  was  peculiar  among 
the  districts  now  included  in  Switzerland,  by  hav- 
ing been  under  a  prince,  while  the  other  cantons 
were  republics,  though  some  of  them  were  aristo- 
cratic republics, — that  is,  they  were  governed  not 
by  the  people  as  in  a  republic,  but  by  an  aristocracy 
of  leading  citizens.  The  ruler  of  Neuchatel  at  the 
time  of  the  reformation,  belonged  to  the  noble  fam- 
ily of  Orleans.  This  line  of  princes  continued  until 
in  the  eighteenth  century,  when,  as  the  line  had  died 
out,  a  Protestant  prince  was  chosen  as  the  ruler  and 
the  land  was  placed  under  the  King  of  Prussia. 
In  the  nineteenth  century,  it,  however,  joined  the 
Swiss  republic.  Remembering  this,  we  will  be  able 
better  to  understand  the  progress  of  the  reforma- 
tion. The  reformer  of  Neuchatel  was  William  Farel, 
the  twin  reformer  of  Calvin,  as  Ecolampadius 
was  of  Zwingli,  and  Melancthon  of  Luther.  Truth 
is  often  stranger  than  fiction  and  his  life  is  fuller 
of  real  adventure  than  many  of  the  exciting  novels 
of  our  day.  He  was  pre-eminent  among  the  re- 
formers for  his  daring,  and  also  for  his  magnificent 


Neuchatel  and  Farel.  99 

voice  and  eloquence.     For  this  he  has  been  named 
"the  Elijah  of  the  Alps." 

He  was  a  Frenchman  by  birth,  having  been  born 
(1489)  at  Gap  in  France,  and  was,  as  he  declared, 
"as  superstitious  a  Catholic  as  could  be  found." 
But  his  eyes  were  opened  to  his  errors  by  Lefevre, 
and  then  he  became  as  devoted  a  Protestant  as  he 
had  been  superstitious  a  Catholic.  For  his  bold 
attack  on  Catholicism  he  was  driven  out  of  France. 
He  came  to  Basle  as  we  saw,  where  his  disputation 
caused  a  sensation.  In  fact  there  was  generally  a 
sensation  when  he  was  about.  But  now  he  was 
greatly  perplexed.  His  soul  was  bursting  to 
preach  the  evangelical  Gospel,  but  he  did  not 
know  where.  Up  to  this  time  only  the  Germans 
had  received  Protestantism  and  he  could  not  speak 
German.  And  to  France,  where  he  might  have 
evangelized  in  his  own  tongue,  he  could  not  re- 
turn. Fortunately  providence  opened  a  loophole 
through  which  he  could  get  into  French  Switzer- 
land. In  our  fifth  chapter,  we  spoke  of  the  great 
influence  of  the  conversion  of  Bern  to  Protestant- 
ism. This  reveals  itself  now.  Bern  had  just  con- 
quered the  northern  coast  of  the  Lake  Geneva  from 


ioo    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

the  Catholic  duke  of  Savoy.  This  region  was 
French  and  this  opened  a  field  for  Farel.  So  he 
went  secretly  to  a  little  village  up  the  Rhine  valley, 
northeast  of  Lake  Geneva  called  Aigle.  He  went 
as  a  schoolmaster,  disguising  himself  still  farther 
under  an  assumed  name  as  Ursinus.  He  quietly 
taught  against  purgatory,  invocation  of  saints  and 
the  pope  himself,  for  several  months,  and  then  there 
was  an  explosion,  as  a  part  of  the  village  followed 
his  teachings.  He  then  revealed  himself  as  Farel. 
He  would  have  been  driven  out,  but  Bern  protected 
him.  A  travelling  friar  crept  into  town  one  day 
and  called  Farel  the  devil.  Farel  went  to  him  and 
demanded  his  proof  for  his  words,  which  so  scared 
the  friar  that  he  apologized.  Farel  was  often 
threatened  and  once  his  pulpit  was  overturned,  but 
he  kept  on  preaching  and  soon  the  whole  Catholic 
district  north  of  the  lake  of  Geneva  heard  about 
him. 

On  a  December  day  (1529)  he  crossed  the  lake 
of  Neuchatel  in  a  small  boat.  If  Caesar  in  his 
boat  across  the  Rubicon  carried  the  destinies  of  the 
Roman  empire,  Farel  now  carried  the  future  of  the 
Canton  of  Neuchatel.  He  landed  at  Serrieres,  a 
few  miles  south  of  the  city  of  Neuchatel.     For  he 


Neuchatel  and  Farel.  101 

had  heard  that  the  parish  priest  there  had  some 
liking-  for  the  Gospel.  The  priest  received  him 
gladly,  but  what  could  he  do !  For  the  Catholic 
bishop  had  forbidden  his  preaching  in  any  of  the 
churches.  However,  the  priest  found  a  way.  He 
suggested  that  there  was  no  embargo  laid  on  the 
rocks  or  the  open  air.  So  Farel  mounted  a  stone 
in  the  cemetery  next  to  the  church  and,  in  the  open 
air,  preached  the  first  Gospel  sermon  in  that  region. 
That  rock  became  the  cornerstone  of  the  future  Re- 
formed Church  of  Neuchatel.*  This  led  him  to 
be  called  to  preach  at  the  city  of  Neuchatel.  At 
the  market  cross  in  the  town  he  preached  and  some 
wanted  to  throw  him  into  a  neighboring  fountain, 
but  he  was  unmoved  by  them.  He  left  Neuchatel 
for  a  time,  going  east  of  the  lake.  Everywhere  he 
found  the  grossest  superstition  in  the  churches.  His 
soul  burned  within  him  against  it.  In  April  he  en- 
tered a  church  a  Tavannes,  where  the  priest  was 
saying  mass.  He  went  up  into  the  pulpit.  The 
astonished  priest  stopped,  and  seeing  it  was  Farel, 
who  began  preaching,  he  fled,  and  the  people  tore 


*A  marble  slab  has  since  been  placed  in  the  wall  of 
the  church,  just  above  this  stone,  stating  that  Farel 
preached  there. 


102    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

away  the  images  in  the  church.  Farel  returned  to 
Neuchatel,  and  on  October  23,  1530,  as  he  was 
preaching  in  the  hospital  there,  the  people  led  him 
up  the  hill  to  the  citadel  through  a  crowd  of  canons 
and  adherents  of  the  Catholic  Church.  He  was 
placed  in  the  pulpit  of  the  cathedral,  located  in  the 
citadel.  After  he  had  preached,  they  cast  out  the 
images,  and  the  traveller,  who  visits  this  church 
to-day,  will  see  in  it  an  inscription  that  on  October 
23,  1530,  idolatry  was  cast  out  of  that  church. 
Thus  the  Reformed  doctrines  gained  the  victory. 

But  Farel's  boldness  nearly  cost  him  his  life.  In 
the  valley  just  west  of  Neuchatel  was  located  its 
sister  town  Vallangin.  Farel  went  over  there  on 
the  great  Catholic  feast  of  the  Assumption.  As  the 
priest  was  preparing  to  chant  the  mass,  Farel  en- 
tered the  pulpit  and  began  preaching.  The  people 
were  awed  by  this  sudden  circumstance,  when  a 
young  man  rushed  up  to  the  priest  and  snatched  the 
host  from  his  hands,  saying  to  the  people,  "This 
is  not  the  God  you  worship,  He  is  above  in  heaven." 
The  Evangelicals  seemed  victorious  and  the  con- 
gregation listened  to  Farel.  But  meanwhile  the 
Catholics  outside  were  preparing  a  great  crowd. 
Farel  and  the  young  man  were  attacked,  and  drag- 


Neuchatel  and  Far  el.  103 

ged  half-dead  to  the  castle  of  the  princess,  who 
lived  there.  They  beat  Farel  (so  that  the  stains 
were  visible  on  the  walls  for  six  years)  and  let  him 
down  into  the  dungeon.  But  Bern  compelled  them 
to  release  him.  Farel,  however,  amid  his  many 
hairbreadth  escapes  never  was  nearer  to  death  than 
at  that  time. 

Soon  after,  in  Lent,  1531,  a  friar  came  to  the 
little  village  of  Orbe,  southeast  of  Neuchatel,  sell- 
ing indulgences  in  the  open  square  of  the  town. 
Suddenly  a  man  stood  up  and  asked,  "Have  you 
indulgences  for  a  man  who  has  killed  his  father 
and  his  mother?"  The  monk  was  confounded  and 
before  he  could  recover,  this  stranger  had  stepped 
on  the  curb  of  the  fountain  there  and  had  begun 
to  preach.  It  was  Farel.  The  friar  was  silenced, 
and  the  reformation  was  begun  there.  From  Orbe 
came  Farel's  great  helper,  young  Peter  Viret. 

But  Farel  was  not  satisfied  with  the  conversion 
of  Neuchatel  and  the  neighborhood.  His  eye  rest- 
ed on  larger  triumphs  than  that.  He  long  prayed 
that  Geneva,  the  largest  city  of  southern  Switzer- 
land, might  receive  the  Gospel.  His  work  at  Gen- 
eva we  will  describe  in  the  next  chapter.  Suffice  it 
to  say  that  Farel,  after  being  at  Geneva  for  four 


104    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

years  (1534-8)  was,  with  Calvin,  driven  out  of  that 
city.  He  returned  to  Neuchatel,  living  there  the 
rest  of  his  life  and  dying  September  13,  1565. 

After  Farel's  death,  no  great  leader  appeared  in 
Neuchatel  for  a  century  and  a  half,  when  the  "sec- 
ond reformer  of  Neuchatel"  appeared  in  John 
Frederick  Osterwald.  He  was  born  at  Neuchatel, 
November  15,  1663.  During  his  education  at 
Neuchatel  he  stayed  at  Zurich  for  a  time,  so  as  to 
learn  German.  He  then  went  to  the  theological 
school  of  Saumur  in  France,  to  study  theology. 
The  liberal  views  of  that  school  left  their  impress 
on  his  doctrinal  views.  He  returned  to  Neuchatel 
in  1685  and  became  an  assistant  pastor  in  that  city. 
During  that  time  he  especially  excelled  as  a  cate- 
chist.  Finding  that  the  catechisms  in  use  were  not 
simple  enough,  he  prepared  a  new  catechism,  on  a 
different  plan,  which  made  his  name  famous.  This 
catechism  is  divided  into  three  parts,  the  first  part 
giving  the  Biblical  history,  the  second  having  the 
doctrines  of  the  church,  and  the  third  is  ethical. 
What  is  remarkable  is  that,  where  before  the  cate- 
chisms were  entirely  doctrinal,  now,  the  ethical  part 
was  larger  than  the  two  other  parts  put  together. 
This  catechism  was  bitterly  attacked  by  the  high 


Neuchatel  and  Farel.  105 

Calvinists  as  a  departure  from  the  Reformed  faith, 
because  he  ignored  predestination  in  it.  It  was 
charged  with  tending  to  rationalism  because  he  laid 
so  much  stress  on  ethics.  Its  use  was  forbidden 
in  the  neighboring  canton  of  Bern,  for  its  sup- 
posed heterodoxy  to  Calvinism. 

His    Compendium    of    Theology    was    published 
1739.      His    theological    views    were    orthodox    on 
fundamentals,  as  the  divinity  of  Christ,  but  he  was 
liberal  in  its  statements  and  revealed  that  he  was 
not  a  Calvinist.     He  was  one  of  the  three  theolog- 
ians of  Switzerland,  who  formed  the  second  theo- 
logical  triumvirate   about    1720.     The   first   trium- 
virate had  been  the  theologians.     Heidegger  of  Zu- 
rich, Gernler  of  Basle,  and  Francis  Turretin  of  Gen- 
eva, who  had  caused  the  high  Calvinistic  creed,  the 
Helvetic  Consensus  to  be  adopted  in  1675.     Now  a 
half  century   later   Alphonse  Turretin  of   Geneva, 
John   Frederick  Osterwald   of  Neuchatel,  and  an- 
tistes   Samuel  Werenfels  of  Basle,  lead  in  setting 
aside   that   creed,   although   Zurich   and   Bern,   the 
hi^h-Calvinistic  cantons,  retained  it  some  time  long- 
er.    Osterwald  also   put   French   Christianity   into 
his  debt  by  his  publication  of  a  new  translation  of 
the  Bible  into  French,  excellent  for  its  simplicity 


106    Famouh  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

and  practical  comments.  He  also  published  a  new 
liturgy  (1713)  very  considerably  increasing  the 
liturgical  forms  over  those  of  Calvin  and  Farel, 
whose  brief  liturgies  had  been  in  use  before.  He 
died  April  14,  1747. 

When  the  rationalism  of  the  eighteenth  century 
appeared,  it  gained  little  power  in  this  canton,  whose 
church  remained  evangelical.  There  was  one  fea- 
ture of  the  government,  that  had  favored  this,  it 
was  the  only  church  in  Switzerland,  separate  from 
the  state.  This  was  due  to  the  fact  that  when  the 
Reformed  religion  was  introduced  into  Neuchatel, 
the  ruler  of  the  land  was  Catholic,  and  therefore 
the  Protestant  faith  could  not  be  united  with  the 
government.  But  in  the  nineteenth  century,  the 
rationalistic  movement  entered  into  the  govern- 
ment, and  the  state  tried  to  get  control  of  the 
church,  so  as  to  make  it  more  formal  and  less  evan- 
gelical. When,  however,  the  state-laws  were 
changed  so  that  the  election  of  the  professors  of 
theology  was,  not  as  before,  by  the  Church,  but 
by  the  state,  a  considerable  part  of  the  church- 
membership  broke  away  and  formed  the  Free 
Church  of  Neuchatel  in  1868.  Its  membership  is 
small,  only  about  6,000,  but  they  are  the  most  active 


Neuchatel  and  Far  el.  107 

and  spiritually  minded  part  of  the  canton.  It 
founded  a  free  church  university  at  Neuchatel,  so 
that  there  are  now  two  universities  there,  one  of 
the  state  and  the  other  of  the  Free  Church;  each 
with  a  theological  faculty. 

The  most  prominent  theological  professor  there 
in  the  nineteenth  century,  and  one  well-known  to 
English  readers  by  his  works,  was  Prof.  Frederick 
Louis  Godet.  He  was  born  at  Neuchatel  October 
25,  1 81 2.  He  studied  in  his  native  city  and  then 
attended  the  universities  of  Bonn  and  Berlin.  He 
became  the  tutor  (1838-44)  of  the  crown-prince  of 
Germany  (later  the  Emperor  Frederick),  and  later 
pastor  at  Neuchatel  (1851-66).  From  1850  up  to 
the  separation  of  the  Free  Church,  he  was  pro- 
fessor of  exegetieal  theology  in  the  theological 
school  of  the  Church.  After  that,  he  occupied  the 
same  position  in  the  Free  Church  theological  school. 
He  died  October  29,  1900,  having  retired  three 
years  before.  He  was  famous  as  an  apologete  and 
exegete  of  the  New  Testament.  His  contemporary 
Prof.  A.  Gretillat,  was  professor  of  theology  and 
his  son  George  Godet  became  also  professor  of  sys- 
tematic theology  after  the  death  of  Gretillet,  but  is 
now  dead. 


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1 

Chapter  MIL— GENEVA,  CALVIN'S  MODEL 
CITY. 

NEXT  to  Zurich,  Geneva  is  the  most  beauti- 
ful city  of  Switzerland,  and  is  also  next 
to  it  in  size.  It  contains  about  125,000 
inhabitants  and  is  beautifully  located  at  the  south- 
ern end  of  the  lake  bearing  its  name.  Through  it, 
dividing  it,  into  two  parts,  flows  the  rapid  deep- 
blue  river  Rhone,  with  its  small  Rosseau's  island 
in  the  centre  of  the  stream.  The  city  east  of  the 
Rhone  rises  to  an  elevation  on  which  stands  the 
Reformed  cathedral  of  St.  Peter;  while  from  the 
Quay  Mt.  Blanc,  on  the  west  side  of  the  river,  a 
fine  view  can  be  had  in  pleasant  weather  of  Mt. 
Blanc  many  miles  away.  Just  below  the  city,  the 
clear  blue  waters  of  the  Rhone  meet  the  muddy 
waters  of  the  Arve  river  and  they  flow  side  by  side 
for  some  time  without  mingling.  It  is  a  city  fa- 
mous for  its  manufacture  of  watches  and  music- 
boxes, — the  former  industry  having  been  brought 
here  by  the  refugees,  who  fled  from  France  on  ac- 
count of  persecution  for  their  Protestantism.  In 
the  days  of  the  reformation  it  became  the  centre 
of  the  Reformed,  as  Wittenberg  had  been  the  cen- 
109  . ; 


no    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

tre  of  the  Lutherans.  Its  rigid  Reformed  doctrines 
and  laws  made  it,  as  even  a  Lutheran  visitor  of  that 
day  granted,  the  "model  city"  of  its  age.  This  was 
the  city,  though  much  smaller  than  at  present 
(about  12,000),  that  Farel  had  his  eye  upon  for  the 
Gospel  of  Christ. 

It  happened  that  just  at  that  time,  there  was  a 
movement  in  the  city  for  civil  liberty.  The  city 
had  been  under  the  control  of  the  Duke  of  Savoy, 
and  Bonnivard,  who  was  the  leader  for  freedom, 
had  been  sent  a  prisoner  in  the  castle  of  Chillon, 
at  the  upper  end  of  Lake  Geneva.  There  his  foot- 
prints in  the  hard  stone,  as  he  walked  around  the 
column  to  which  he  was  chained,  are  still  shown  to 
the  traveller.  Byron  has  immortalized  this  in  his 
Childe  Harold : 

"Chillon,  thy  prison  is  a  holy  place, 
And  thy  sad  floor  an  altar, — for  'twas  trod 
By  Bonnivard, — may  none  those  marks  efface." 

Farel  first  visited  the  city  on  his  return  from  a 
visit  to  the  Waldensees.  But  he  was  brought  be- 
fore the  court  and  expelled.  On  his  departure  a 
gun  was  levelled  at  him  but  failed  to  go  off,  whereat 
he  courageously  replied,  "I  am  not  to  be  shaken  by 


Geneva,  Calvin's  Model  City.  in 

a  pop-gun.  Your  toy  does  not  alarm  me."  As  he 
dared  not  himself  go  back  to  Geneva,  he  decided 
to  try  the  plan  he  had  so  successfully  tried  at  Aigle, 
to  send  a  school-teacher  to  Geneva.  So  he  sent 
Froment,  who  opened  a  school,  but  in  it  taught 
the  Protestant  doctrines.  He  also  began  holding 
meetings  in  a  private  house.  But  one  day  on  New 
Year,  1533,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  the  council  had 
forbidden  him  to  preach,  the  Huguenots  came  in 
such  numbers  that  they  forced  him  to  preach  in  the 
open  square,  east  of  the  Rhone,  called  the  Molard. 
And  three  months  later  at  sunrise,  the  few  believers 
celebrated  the  Lord's  Supper  in  a  garden  near  the 
city  gate,  after  the  simple  manner  of  the  Protest- 
ants. But  Farel  had  back  of  him  the  influence  of 
the  canton  of  Berne  and  its  officials  took  Farel  to  a 
conference  in  Geneva,  so  that  he  was  permitted  to 
preach  in  the  Franciscan  Church  and  on  Whit- 
suntide (1534)  to  administer  the  communion  to  a 
large  number.  The  work  grew  on  his  hands  so 
greatly  that  he  prayed  God  to  send  him  a  helper. 
God  answered  his  prayer. 

One  day  in  1536  a  young  man  arrived  at  Geneva 
named  John  Calvin.  He  was  a  Frenchman,  born 
at  Noyon  in  Picardy,  July  10,  1509.     He  studied 


U2     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

at  Paris,  Bourges  and  Orleans,  and  then  while  in 
Paris  (1532)  he  fully  united  himself  with  the  Re- 
formed. Driven  out  of  Paris,  he  wandered  for 
several  years  in  France  as  at  Angouleme  with  Du 
Tillet,  at  Poictiers,  where  he  celebrated  the  Lord's 
Supper  in  a  cave.  He  then  fled  from  France 
through  Strasburg  to  Basle,  where  he  published  his 
epochal  book,  his  "Institutes  of  the  Christian  Reli- 
gion." After  visiting  northern  Italy  and  returning 
to  France  for  a  brief  season,  he  was  about  going  to 
Germany  to  study  when  he  stopped  at  Geneva  over 
night,  in  the  latter  part  of  July,  1536.  Farel, 
when  he  heard  that  the  author  of  the  Institutes  of 
Theology  was  in  town,  decided  that  Calvin  was  the 
man  he  had  been  praying  for.  He  called  on  Cal- 
vin and  then  occurred  one  of  the  most  dramatic 
scenes  in  all  Protestant  Church  history, — certainly 
in  Reformed  Church  history. 

Farel  urged  Calvin  to  stay  and  preach  the  Gos- 
pel at  Geneva.  Calvin  replied  to  him  with  aston- 
ishment, "I  can  not  stop  here  more  than  a  night." 
Farel  pointed  out  to  him  how  the  reformation  had 
been  miraculously  established  at  Geneva, — that  if 
he  did  not  take  up  the  work,  it  would  probably  per- 
ish and  Calvin's  refusal  would  be  the  cause  of  the 


Geneva,  Calvin's  Model  City.  113 

ruin  of  the  Church.     But  Calvin  did  not  want  to 
bind  himself  to  any  particular  church.    He  wanted 
to  travel  and  to  study.    "Study,  leisure,"  said  Farel, 
"what,  must  we  never  practice,  I  am  sinking  under 
my  task.    Pray  help  me !"    Calvin  then  pled  another 
excuse   that   the   frail   condition   of  his   health   re- 
quired   rest.      "Rest,"    answered    the    fiery    Farel, 
"death  alone  permits  the  soldiers  of  Christ  to  rest 
from  their  labors."     But  still  Calvin  held  back.  He 
felt  he  was  too  weak  to  undertake  the  responsibil- 
ities of  reforming  so  large  a  city.     At  this  Farel 
could  no  longer  restrain  his  feelings.     "Ought  a 
servant  of  Christ  to  be  so  delicate,"  he  said  "as 
to  be  frightened  at  warfare."    This  sentence  some- 
what touched  Calvin.     The  thought  of  preferring 
ease  to  the  service  of  Christ  frightened  him.     His 
conscience    now    became   troubled.         He   became 
greatly  agitated.     Farel  was  evidently  making  an 
impression  on  him.     But  still  his  retiring  disposi- 
tion and  lack  of  confidence  in   himself  held  him 
back.     "I  beg  of  you,"  he  said  to  Farel,  "to  have 
pity  on  me."     Farel,  seeing  that  Calvin  began  to 
weaken,  now  advanced  to  threatening.    He  remind- 
ed Calvin  how  the  Lord  had  dealt  with  Jonah,  a 
case  similar  to  his  own.     "Jonah  also,"  he  said, 


ii4    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

"wanted  to  flee  from  the  presence  of  the  Lord,  but 
the  Lord  cast  him  into  the  sea."  Calvin  now  be- 
came more  deeply  agitated,  Farel's  heart  was  hot 
within  him.  Finally,  lifting  his  hand  to  heaven, 
with  his  voice  of  thunder  he  pronounced  the  sen- 
tence, "In  the  name  of  Almighty  God,  I  declare  that 
if  you  do.  not  answer  the  summons,  he  will  not  bless 
your  plans.  And  then  fixing  his  eyes  of  fire  on 
the  young  man  and  placing  his  hands  as  if  on  the 
head  of  a  victim,  he  cried  out,  "May  God  curse 
your  studies,  if  in  such  a  great  necessity,  you  with- 
draw and  refuse  to  give  us  help  and  support."  At 
these  words  Calvin  trembled  in  every  limb.  He 
asked  to  be  permitted  to  consider  and  pray  over  it 
till  morning.  In  the  morning  he  decided  to  accept 
this  call  of  God  and  stay  at  Geneva. 

Calvin  began  preaching  and  lecturing  on  the- 
ology. By  November  he  caused  the  city  council  to 
adopt  a  confession  of  faith,  which  ordered  a  strict 
morality.  But  this  soon  proved  to  be  too  rigid 
for  the  easy-going  pleasure-loving  Genevese. 
Hence  a  strong  party,  called  the  Libertines,  rose 
against  these  reformers.  They  made  use  of  a  pretext 
to  get  rid  of  them.  Bern,  who  was  then  in  league 
with  Geneva,  wanted  unleavened  bread  to  be  used 


Geneva,  Calvin's  Model  City.  115 

at  the  communion,  while  Calvin  and  Farel  used 
only  leavened  bread.  The  Bernese  wanted  the 
Church  at  Geneva,  which  observed  only  Sunday  as 
a  holy  day,  to  observe  also  the  festival  days.  These 
petty  differences  the  Libertine  party  used  as  a  pre- 
text to  drive  out  Calvin  and  Farel.  At  Easter, 
1538,  matters  came  to  a  crisis.  Farel  preached  at 
St.  Gervais  and  refused  to  give  the  communion,  as 
did  Calvin  at  the  cathedral.  And  when  the  Liber- 
tines rushed  forward  to  take  it,  they  were  refused. 
The  city  council  then  banished  Calvin  and  Farel 
for  disobedience.  Calvin  went  to  Strasburg  while 
Farel,  as  we  have  seen,  went  to  Neuchatel.* 

But  with  Calvin  absent,  Geneva  went  from  bad 
to  worse  until  finally  something  had  to  be  done; 
so  the  city  council  in  despair  resolved  to  recall  him 
in  1540.  He  refused,  saying  "it  would  be  better  to 
perish  at  once  than  to  be  tormented  in  that  cham 
ber  of  torture."  Three  times  they  asked  him  to 
come  back  and  finally  he  consented.  On  September 
13,  1 541,  he  returned  to  spend  the  remaining  twen- 
ty-three years  of  his  life  there. 


*Calvin's  life  at   Strasburg  will  be  given  in  Book  2, 
chapter  I. 


n6    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

The  first  five  years  (1541-6)  were  comparatively- 
peaceful.  Severe  laws  against  evil  were  enacted, 
but  Calvin  now  had  his  own  way,  as  the  city  had 
begged  him  to  return.  Meanwhile  he  thoroughly 
organized  the  church.  For  Calvin  not  only  ex- 
celled as  a  theologian  and  commentator,  but  to  his 
great  mental  ability  he  united  rare  practical  tact. 
He  also  became  the  great  organizer  of  the  Reform- 
ed Church  by  giving  her  the  Presbyterial  form  of 
government,  although  in  this  respect  he  frequently 
gets  some  of  the  glory  that  belongs  to  Lasco,  es- 
pecially in  the  organization  of  the  congregation. 
The  following  ten  years  (1 546-1 556)  were  years  of 
controversy.  The  Libertines  again  arose  to  power. 
In  1547  their  opposition  became  so  great,  that  be- 
fore the  city  council  he  declared,  "If  it  is  my  life, 
you  desire,  I  am  ready  to  die.  If  my  banishment, 
I  shall  exile  myself."  So  great  was  the  hatred  of 
the  Libertines  towards  him  that  they  named  their 
dogs  after  him.  Fifty  shots  were  fired  off  before 
his  bed-chamber.  At  a  communion,  where  he  was 
about  to  refuse  it  to  the  Libertines,  because  their 
lives  were  unworthy,  they  rushed  forward  to  take 
the  bread  and  wine  by  force,  when  Calvin  covered 
the  sacred  symbols  with  his  hands  saying  "You  may 


Geneva,  Calvin's  Model  City.  117 

cut  off  these  hands  and  crush  these  limbs,  but  you 
shall  never  force  me  to  give  holy  things  to  the  pro- 
fane." His  boldness  and  firmness  so  impressed  the 
Libertines  that  they  fell  back. 

The  climax  of  this  controversy  came  when  Serve- 
tus  came  to  Geneva.  Calvin  had  him  arrested.  He 
was  later  burned  in  1553,  for  which  Calvin  has 
been  held  responsible  by  history.  But  it  is  to  be  re- 
membered that  at  that  time  Calvin's  enemies,  the 
Libertines,  were  in  control  at  Geneva,  and  they, 
and  not  Calvin,  were  Servetus's  judges,  who  con- 
demned him.  However,  there  is  no  denying  that 
Calvin  approved  of  his  death,  but  in  that  he  was 
not  alone.  All  the  reformers  of  that  day,  even 
Lutherans  like  Melancthon,  approved  of  it,  only 
one  voice,  a  Reformed  layman  from  Bern,  Zurkin- 
den,  being  lifted  up  against  it.  Besides  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  Servetus  was  condemned  under 
laws  made  before  Calvin  came  to  the  city ;  and  also 
that  the  sixteenth  century  was  not  the  twentieth 
century.  Civil  and  religious  liberty,  such  as  we 
now  have,  were  unknown  in  that  age.  Probably 
four  centuries  after  this,  the  world  will  consider 
us  very  bigoted  on  some  points.  Our  defense  can 
only  be  that  we  are  not  living  ahead  of  our  day. 


n8     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Still  to  lessen  these  criticisms  against  Calvin,  in 
1903  a  number  of  the  followers  of  Calvin  especially 
among  the  French,  placed  an  expiatory  monument 
at  Geneva  on  the  spot  where  Servetus  was  burned. 
On  it  they  declare  their  high  appreciation  of  Cal- 
vin and  yet  condemn  his  mistake  about  Servetus. 

The  last  years  of  his  life  were  spent  in  com- 
parative quietness.  In  1550  he  did  what  he  had 
long  desired  to  do, — founded  a  theological  school 
in  which  to  train  ministers.  Over  its  doorway  in 
the  Place  St.  Antoine,  where- it  still  stands,  are  the 
words  "Post  tenebras  lux"  (After  darkness  light). 
This  was  the  germ  out  of  which  the  present  uni- 
versity of  Geneva  has  since  grown.  Calvin  called 
as  its  rector  Theodore  Beza,  who  later  became  his 
successor  as  reformer  at  Geneva.  But  overwork 
began  to  tell  on  a  frame  never  very  strong.  His 
last  sermon  was  delivered  February,  1564.  On 
Easter  he  was  carried  to  the  church  to  receive  the 
communion.  On  April  30  he  bade  farewell  to  the 
councillors  of  Geneva,  exhorting  them  to  be  stead- 
fast. On  May  19  he  bade  farewell  to  the  ministers. 
Finally,  on  Sabbath  eve,  May  27,  1564,  he  fell 
asleep,  to  open  his  eyes  on  an  eternal  Sabbath  with 
his  Lord.     With  his  characteristic  modesty,  he  or- 


Geneva,  Calvin's  Model  City.  119 

dered  that  no  monument  should  be  erected  to  his 
memory.     But  in  the  cemetery  of  Geneva,  located 
on  the  east  side  of  the  Rhone,  is  a  small  square 
stone  marked  "J.  C,"  which,  tradition  says,  marks 
the  place  where  he  was  buried.     Still  he  needs  no 
such  monument.     Greater  than  any  monument  of 
marble  or  granite  is  the  monument  that  he  has 
erected      in     the     Reformed     and      Presbyterian 
Churches,  now  founded  all  over  the  globe  and  num- 
bering about  25  millions  of  adherents.    At  the  400th 
anniversary  of  his  birth,  July  10,  1909,  the  corner- 
stone of  the  new  monument  to  Calvin  was  laid  on 
the  Promenade  des  Bastions.     In  this  monument, 
Calvin,  Farel,  Beza  and  Knox  are  to  form  the  cen- 
tral group,  which  stands  out  before  the  huge  in- 
scription of  Geneva's  motto,  "Post  tenebras  lux." 
On  either  side  are  smaller  figures  of  distinguished 
Calvinists  as  Coligny,  William  of  Orange,  Crom- 
well, Roger  Williams,  Elector  Frederick  William 
of  Brandenburg  and  Prince  Stephen  Bocaskey  of 
Hungary.     We  regret  that  Roger  Williams  is  the 
American  representative,  as  he  is  a  Baptist,  which 
Calvin  was  not,  and  besides  a  far  greater  Calvinist 
intellectually  in  America  was  Jonathan  Edwards, 
who  should,  by  all  means,  have  represented  Amer- 


120    famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

ica.  On  the  blocks  of  granite  are  inscriptions  com- 
memorating Zwingli,  Luther  and  the  forerunners 
of  the  reformation,  Waldo,  Wyckliffe  and  Huss. 
A  noble  life,  a  beautiful  death,  and  a  wonderful 
influence  on  the  world  was  Calvin's. 

John  Knox,  the  Scotch  reformer,  was  in  Geneva 
I555"9-  The  English  congregation,  of  which  he 
was  pastor,  worshiped  in  the  new  Notre  Dame 
Church,  now  the  Auditorium  of  Philosophy.  In 
the  city  hall  is  a  book,  "The  Book  of  the  English," 
giving  the  names  of  this  English  congregation,  212 
in  number.  Among  them  were  English  scholars  of 
first  rank,  as  Whittingham,  Gilly  and  Sampson, 
who  produced  the  famous  Geneva  Bible  in  1560. 
After  the  accession  of  Queen  Elizabeth  to  the 
throne  of  England  in  1558,  the  exiles  began  leav- 
ing Geneva  for  England.     Knox  left  Feb.  7,  1559. 

There  are  in  Geneva  to-day  a  number  of  places 
connected  with  Calvin's  life.  First  and  foremost  is 
his  church,  the  beautiful  cathedral  of  St.  Peter, 
with  its  beautiful  side  chapel  of  the  Maccabees.  In 
the  church  is  the  pulpit  from  which  Calvin  preach- 
ed, and  beneath  it  stands  the  chair  in  which  he 
sat.  The  chair  appears  somewhat  stiff  and  straight, 
but  a  Presbyterian  minister,  who  once  saw  it  with 


Geneva,  Calvin's  Model  City.  121 

me,  remarked  that,  If  that  was  Calvin's  chair,  it 
was  no  wonder  Presbyterianism  was  so  stiff  and 
straight.  (He  also  added  on  seeing  the  blue  river 
Rhone  flowing  through  the  city,  that  now  he  knew 
where  Presbyterian  blue  came  from.)  The  cathe- 
dral, like  all  Calvinistic  churches,  is  very  plain,  only 
two  memorials  being  allowed  in  it.  The  first  is 
the  monument  to  Duke  Henry  of  Rohan,  of  whom 
we  spoke  in  connection  with  the  canton  of  the 
Grisons.  There  is  also,  not  a  tomb,  but  a  tablet 
to  the  memory  of  Agrippa  d'  Aubigne,  another 
great  Huguenot,  the  confidante  of  King  Henry  IV, 
of  France,  a  great  statesman,  a  great  general,  and 
a  great  literary  character,  being  the  finest  satirist 
of  his  age  in  French.  Driven  out  of  France  he 
settled  in  Geneva  and  died  there  1630,  leaving  2,000 
gulden  for  the  education  of  students  for  the  min- 
istry. One  of  his  descendents  was  Rev.  Prof. 
Merle  d'  Aubigne,  the  famous  author  of  the  His- 
tory of  the  Reformation. 

Calvin's  house  is  also  shown  on  Calvin  street 
(Rue  Calvin)  near  the  cathedral,  but  the  present 
house  was  built  later  than  Calvin,  though  doubt- 
less it  occupies  the  location  where  Calvin  lived.  In 
the  Place  St.  Antoine  is  the  old  theological  school 


122    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

with  its  motto  over  the  door,  "Post  Tenebras  lux." 
In  the  Musee  Rath  is  a  large  painting  of  Calvin's 
farewell  to  the  ministers  of  Geneva.  There  is  also 
a  large  hall  called  the  Hall  of  the  Reformation 
(Salle  de  la  reformation)  in  Rue  de  Rhone,  which 
is  dedicated  to  the  churches  of  the  reformation.  In 
it  is  a  fine  museum  of  relics  of  the  reformation  and 
Calvin-curios,  gathered  mainly  by  Rev.  Mr.  Choisy, 
one  of  the  pastors  of  Geneva.  Here  are  a  number 
of  rare  pictures  in  connection  with  Calvin's  life 
and  also  of  Beza  and  Viret  as  well  as  of  later  the- 
ologians of  Geneva,  the  last  will  of  Agrippa  d' 
Aubigne;  also  a  number  of  Calvin's  books,  al- 
though these  can  also  be  found  in  the  library  of  the 
university.  In  an  adjoining  room  is  a  collection  of 
missionary  relics  of  the  Paris  and  Romande  Mis- 
sionary Societies.  It  is  a  very  respectable  Calvin 
Museum. 


Chapter    IX.— GENEVA,    SINCE    CALVIN'S 
TIME. 

CALVIN'S  successor  was  Theodore  Beza. 
Like  Calvin,  he  was  a  Frenchman  by  birth, 
(born  1 5 19)  but  he  had  been  a  worldly 
Frenchman  in  his  early  life.  Before  he  became  a 
Protestant,  he  had  gained  fame  as  one  of  the  great- 
est of  France's  poets  and  literary  men.  A  sickness 
in  1568  brought  this  worldly,  thoughtless  French- 
man to  seriousness  and  led  him  to  become  a  Pro- 
testant. He  went  to  Geneva  to  study  under  Cal- 
vin. Later  he  became  professor  of  the  Protestant 
school  at  Lausanne ;  and,  when  compelled  to  leave 
in  1558,  he  went  to  Geneva,  and  became  the  head  ot 
the  newly  founded  theological  school  of  Calvin. 
After  Calvin's  death  he  became  his  successor  as  the 
leading  reformer  of  Geneva.  Though  more  genial 
than  Calvin,  yet  he  possessed  great  scholarship,  es- 
pecially in  Biblical  criticism,  as  is  shown  by  his 
Codex  of  the  New  Testament.  He  utilized  his  rare 
poetical  genius  in  the  writing  of  Psalms  for  the 
Church,  and  as  a  result  the  French  Church  became 
a  great  Psalm-singing  church.  He  was  a  beauti- 
ful writer  and  a  magnificent  orator.  He  combined 
123 


124    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

all  the  polite  graces  of  the  French  courtier,  with  the 
virtues  of  a  Christian.  These  qualities  placed  him 
not  only  at  the  head  of  the  Genevan  Church  but 
of  the  Church  of  France.  He,  it  was,  who  was 
chosen  to  defend  the  Huguenot  religion  before  the 
King  of  France  at  Poissy,  of  which  we  shall  speak 
in  connection  with  Paris.  He  died  in  1605,  the  last 
of  the  reformers.  He  developed  the  theology  of 
Calvin,  higher  than  Calvin  had  done,  into  supra- 
lapsarianism.  He  was  a  rare  combination  of  a 
scholar,  a  courtier  and  a  Christian. 

Toward  the  close  of  Beza's  life  occurred  the  Es- 
calade on  December  12,  1602.  On  a  dark  and  foggy 
night  several  hundred  of  the  soldiers  of  the  Cath- 
olic Duke  of  Savoy,  who  formerly  had  been  the 
ruler  of  Geneva,  gained  the  top  of  the  walls  of 
Geneva  and  were  about  opening  the  city  gate  to 
several  thousand  more  Savoy  troops  who  were  out- 
side. But  just  as  they  were  about  doing  this,  they 
were  discovered  by  one  of  the  sentry  of  Geneva, 
whom  they  killed  but  not  until  he  had  fired  his 
gun,  which  alarmed  the  city.  At  once  thousands 
of  armed  citizens  attacked  them.  A  cannon  was 
shot  on  the  wall  by  the  Genevese,  which  was  guided 
by  the  hand  of  providence  through  the  darkness,  so 


Geneva  Since  Calvin's  Time.  125 

that  it  knocked  down  all  their  scaling-ladders. 
Those  in  the  city  could  not  escape  and  were  thus 
caught  like  rats  in  a  trap.  They  were  cut  to  pieces 
and  thrown  over  the  walls  and  the  city  saved.  As 
soon  as  the  enemy  was  driven  away,  the  Genevese 
streamed  to  the  cathedral  for  a  thanksgiving  ser- 
vice under  Beza.  Since  that  time  on  every  Decem- 
ber 12,  a  religious  service  is  held  in  Geneva  in 
commemoration  of  that  Escalade  and  there  is  a 
fountain  on  one  of  the  streets  (Rue  des  Alle- 
mands)  to  commemorate  it.  As  a  result  of  this 
attack,  the  foreign  Protestant  powers  especially 
Holland  and  Berne  took  greater  care  for  the  de- 
fense of  Geneva,  the  former  contributing  much  to 
Geneva's  fortification. 

After  Beza,  came  a  succession  of  leading  the- 
ologians. John  Diodati  succeeded  Beza.  He  was 
of  Italian  descent,  but  his  father  emigrated  to  Gen- 
eva, where  he  became  professor  of  theology.  The 
son  was  a  fine  linguist,  translating  the  Bible  into 
Italian  and  French.  The  former  version  is  so  fine 
that  it  is  still  the  standard  version  of  the  Bible  in 
Italian.  He  was  one  of  the  delegates  of  Geneva  to 
the  Synod  of  Dort,  and  with  Breitinger  of  Zurich 
was  the  leader  of  the  Swiss  delegation.  In  doc- 
trine, like  Beza,  he  was  a  supralapsarian  Calvinist. 


126     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

After  Diodati  came  another  great  theologian  to 
continue  the  succession,  Francis  Turretin.  He,  like 
Diodati,  was  a  descendent  of  an  Italian  refugee. 
He  was  in  his  early  life  sent  to  Holland  to  get  Hol- 
land's aid  in  fortifying  Geneva,  in  which  errand  he 
was  very  successful.  He  was  not  like  his  prede- 
cessors, Beza  and  Diodati,  Supralapsarian ;  but  he 
lowered  that  extreme  type  of  Calvinism  to  Coc- 
ceianism.  This  was  the  Biblical  school  of  Calvin- 
ism founded  by  Koch  or  Cocceius  and  is  sometimes 
called  the  Theology  of  the  Covenants,  because  it 
makes  prominent  the  two  covenants  of  works  and 
of  grace.  He  redacted  Calvin's  theology  according 
to  this  Federal  theology.  He  was  one  of  the  the- 
ologican  triumvirate  of  Switzerland  of  his  day — 
Heidegger  of  Zurich,  and  Gernler  of  Basle,  being 
the  other  two,  although  really  a  fourth  ought  to  be 
added,  Hummel  of  Bern,  thus  making  it  a  quartette. 
These  men  caused  a  new  Calvinistic  creed  to  be 
drawn  up,  the  Helvetic  Consensus,  and  published 
in  1675.  This  creed  was  so  high,  that  it  held  that 
even  the  vowel-points  of  the  Old  Testament  were 
inspired.  This  was  the  extremest  of  the  Calvinistic 
creeds. 

This  creed  continued  in  authority  all  over  Swit- 


Geneva  Since  Calvin's  Time.  127 

zerland  for  about  fifty  years  and  then  another  the- 
ological triumvirate,  Werenfels  of  Basle,  Oster- 
wald  of  Neuchatel,  and  J.  A.  Turretin  of  Geneva, 
the  latter  the  son  of  Francis  Turretin,  mentioned 
above,  united  to  set  it  aside. 

The  Church  at  Geneva  was  now  on  the  down- 
grade theologically.  J.  A.  Turretin  was  not  the 
strict  Calvinist  his  father  had  been,  but-  was  a 
broad-churchman,  who  cared  nothing  for  creeds. 
His  successor,  Vernet,  went  farther;  he  was  a  So- 
cinian,  denying  the  divinity  of  Jesus  Christ.  Thus 
by  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century,  Geneva 
had  descended  from  the  strictest  Calvinism  in  the 
1 6th  century,  to  the  widest  Unitarianism  in  the 
nineteenth.  This  departure  was  heralded  to  the 
world  by  D'Alembert  in  the  eighteenth  century. 
He  was  the  editor  of  the  infidel  encyclopaedia  and 
he  charged  the  Genevan  Church  with  denying  the 
divinity  of  Christ.  This  caused  a  great  sensation 
at  Geneva  and  elsewhere,  but  it  was  true. 

During  this  period  of  rationalism  there  appeared 
at  Geneva  two  prominent  literary  characters,  one 
a  Genevese  by  birth,  John  Jacques  Rosseau,  the 
other  a  Frenchman,  Voltaire.  Rosseau  was  of  a 
low  moral  character  but  of  high  ideals  politically 


128    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

and  educationally — first  a  Protestant,  then  a  Cath- 
olic, then  a  Protestant,  then  a  deist  or  infidel  (The 
last  is  shown  in  his  creed  of  the  Vicar  of  Savoy). 
Religion  sat  lightly  on  him  and  yet  he  was  a  man  of 
genius.  After  leaving  Geneva,  he  went  to  Paris, 
but  finally  on  account  of  the  suspicion  of  the  gov- 
ernments against  him,  because  of  his  political 
views  (he  was  a  democrat),  he  was  forced  to  be- 
come a  wanderer.  But  he  was  the  apostle  of  his 
age  for  education  and  freedom.  The  first  appeared 
in  his  book  "Emile"  which  was  written  against  the 
stiff  formal  artificial  method  of  education  in  his 
day.  His  political  views  appeared  in  his  work  "The 
Social  Contract,"  where  he  taught  that  all  men  were 
born  free  and  equal  and  yet  all  were  slaves.  In  that 
age  of  monarchies  and  aristocracies  such  doctrines 
were  viewed  as  very  dangerous  indeed.  Undoubt- 
edly Rosseau's  views  led  to  the  French  revolution. 
Both  of  these  books,  "Emile"  and  "Social  Con- 
tract," were  publicly  burned  at  Geneva  by  the  hang- 
man in  1763  as  tending  to  destroy  Christianity  and 
civil  government.  Geneva  gave  to  the  world  the 
two  great  teachers  who  led  to  civil  liberty,  Calvin 
and  Rosseau.  It  is  to  be  remembered  that  we  in 
the  United  States  owe  our  republic  to  Geneva,  to 


Geneva  Since  Calvin  s  Time.  129 

Calvin  and  Rosseau.  Calvin  has  been  called  the 
founder  of  republics,  as  of  Holland,  Switzerland 
and  the  United  States.  Such  is  the  testimony  of 
leading  historians,  as  Bancroft,  Ranke  and  Motley. 
Perhaps  it  might  better  be  said  that  Calvinism  was 
the  founder  of  republics,  for  Calvin  himself  was  an 
aristocrat,  but  his  principles  seem  to  have  led  his- 
torically to  republicanism  and  his  followers  founded 
republics.  Rosseau  gave  utterance  to  the  princi- 
ples on  which  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States 
is  founded,  namely  that  all  men  are  free  and  equal. 
But  he  never  could  have  carried  that  out.  It  was 
Calvinism  that  created  the  spirit  and  gave  the 
proper  poise  and  strength  to  carry  out  the  princi- 
ples of  liberty.  Rosseauism,  without  Calvinism  to 
guide  and  strengthen  it,  ran  riot  in  anarchy,  as  in 
the  French  revolution.  But  with  Calvinism  it  pro- 
duced great  republics,  as  the  United  States. 

Voltaire  was  like  Rosseau  an  infidel,  but  unlike 
him,  an  aristocrat.  He  came  to  Geneva  in  1755 
and  tried  to  corrupt  the  simple  Genevese  by  intro- 
ducing the  theatre.  But  the  Genevese  government 
put  the  ban  on  it.  So  he  bought  a  place  at  Fer- 
ney  in  France,  a  few  miles  north  of  Geneva.  There 
he  tormented  Geneva  to  his  heart's  content.     He 


130    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

built  a  theatre  in  which  the  greatest  actors  came 
to  play  and  to  which,  in  spite  of  the  protests  of 
their  pastors,  the  people  went  in  throngs.  He  pub- 
lished his  infidel  books  and  leavened  Geneva  with 
them,  although  the  Genevan  Church  tried  to  de- 
fend herself  against  them.  But  what  defense  could 
a  church  filled  full  of  that  Socinianism  that  denies 
the  divinity  of  our  Lord  make  against  an  infidel, 
when  she  is  so  near  infidelity  herself?  Voltaire's 
books,  though  forbidden  to  be  circulated  by  the  city 
of  Geneva,  yet  found  their  way  everywhere,  as  at 
the  doors  of  the  councillors,  on  the  benches  in  the 
parks ;  yes,  in  the  very  catechisms  of  the  catechu- 
mens, who  were  thus  taught  irreligion,  when  they 
were  seeking  religion.  This  last  effort  of  Voltaire's 
was  diabolical.  Voltaire  boasted  that  in  a  century 
Christianity  would  be  dead.  That  might  have  been 
true  of  the  emasculated  Christianity  that  was  then 
in  vogue  at  Geneva.  But  even  that  sort  of  reli- 
gion outlived  Voltaire's  boasts,  and  continued  to 
exist, — How  much  less  would  evangelical  Chris- 
tianity go  down  before  Voltaire's  infidelity.  He  re- 
mained at  Ferney  for  about  twenty  years  as  the 
thorn  in  the  Genevan  Church  and  then  went  to 
Paris  where  he  died.     His  chateau  at  Ferney  now 


Geneva  Since  Calvin's  Time.  131 

contains  a  Voltaire  museum  and  near  it  is  the 
church  he  built,  on  which  are  the  words  "Deo 
erexit  Voitaire"  (Voltaire  erected  it  to  God). 
There  is  also  a  statue  of  Voltaire  at  Ferney,  Gen- 
eva, having  passed  through  Socinianism,  Rosseau- 
ism  and  Voltairism,  had  the  climax  put  upon  it  by 
the  French  revolution,  during  which  she  became 
temporarily  connected  with  France. 

The  result  of  all  this  was,  that  not  only  did  Cal- 
vinism disappear  at  Geneva  but  evangelical  Chris- 
tianity was  almost  extinct  in  the  early  part  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  Then  occurred  the  wonderful 
movement  called  the  "Revival."  In  181 7  there 
came  to  Geneva  a  Scotchman,  Robert  Haldane.  A 
wonderful  story  is  this  revival  even  before  it  began. 
A  British  sea-captain  named  James  Haldane  in  a 
naval  battle  had  called  up  a  new  squad  of  men,  to 
take  the  place  of  those  swept  off  the  deck  by  a 
broadside.  Seeing  some  signs  of  cowardice,  he 
swore  at  them ;  when  he  was  politely  but  firmly 
rebuked  by  one  of  the  sailors.  This  rebuke  led  to 
his  conversion  from  infidelity.  His  brother,  Rob- 
ert Haldane,  was  an  unbeliever,  who,  finding  that 
his  naval  brother  had  become  a  Christian,  ordered 
him  from  his  house.     As  the  latter  went  away,  he 


132    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

called  back,  "But  I  can  pray  for  you."  His  pray- 
ers were  answered  and  Robert  Haldane  became  a 
Christian.  Robert  decided  to  give  his  life  and 
great  wealth  to  missionary  work,  and  wanted  to  go 
to  India,  but  the  East  India  Company  was  opposed 
to  missionaries  and  would  not  take  him.  So  he 
went  to  the  continent  of  Europe  seeking  a  place  to 
work  but  could  find  none.  Early  in  1817  he  hap- 
pened to  visit  Geneva  because  he  had  heard  the 
Church  there  was  very  dead  and  rationalistic.  But 
he  could  not  find  an  opening  there. 

He  was  about  leaving  the  city,  when  providence 
opened  the  way.  He  had  made  an  engagement 
with  one  of  the  three  pastors  who  were  evangelical, 
Moulinie,  that  he  should  take  him  to  an  interesting 
place  near  the  city.  But  Moulinie  became  sick,  and, 
in  his  stead,  sent  one  of  the  theological  students  of 
the  university.  That  proved  to  be  Haldane's  op- 
portunity. He  questioned  the  young  man  and 
found  him  utterly  ignorant  of  the  evangelical  doc- 
trines of  the  Bible.  As  d'Aubigne  later  said,  "St. 
Seneca  and  St.  Plato  were  better  known  to  the  stu- 
dents than  St.  Paul  or  St.  John."  But  he  found  the 
student  not  averse  to  evangelical  truth.  So  he  deter- 
mined to  remain  at  Geneva.  He  rented  a  room  in  the 


Geneva  Since  Calvin's  Time.  133 

Place  de  la  St.  Antoine,  No.  19,  just  south  of  the 
theological  school  of  Geneva.  And  there  he  gather- 
ed the  students  to  a  series  of  lectures  on  Paul's 
Epistle  to  the  Romans.  They  were  much  surprised  at 
his  knowledge  of  the  Bible,  and  more  so  at  his  ab- 
solute child-like  faith  in  its  teachings.  His  lec- 
tures became  so  popular  with  the  students  that  all 

attended,  while  the  rationalistic  professors  of  the 
theological   school   were  very  angry.     Cheneviere, 

later  one  of  the  professors,  walked  up  and  down  the 
Place  St.  Antoine  enraged  but  unable  to  prevent 
the  attendance  of  the  students.  Haldane  remained 
only  a  few  weeks  but  the  eyes  of  the  young  men 
were  opened  to  the  Gospel  as  were  Paul's  at  Da- 
mascus. After  he  left,  the  Church  at  Geneva  re- 
fused to  ordain  any  student  unless  he  promised  not 
to  preach  the  evangelical  doctrines  and  not  to  at- 
tend prayer-meetings.  But  in  spite  of  this,  Hal- 
dane sowed  for  an  abundant  harvest.  These  young 
men  became  leaders  in  the  different  churches.  Thus 
Pyt  and  John  Monod  went  to  France  to  produce 
a  revival  in  that  church,  Merle  D'  Aubigne  labored 
at  Geneva  later  as  professor,  and  Felix  Neff  became 
the  self-denying  evangelist  of  the  high  Alps. 

Perhaps    the    most    remarkable    conversion    was 


134    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

that  of  Rev.  Caesar  Malan,  a  young  minister  of  the 
Genevan  Church,  who  came  under  Haldane's  in- 
fluence. After  his  conversion  he  boldly  preached 
the  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith  in  one  of  the 
churches,  which  almost  resulted  in  riot.  Scowls 
and  threatening  looks  were  his  as  he  passed  out  of 
the  church ;  only  one  person  greeting  him  at  the 
door  with  praise  and  that  was  Haldane,  who  said, 
"Thank  God,  the  Gospel  of  Calvin  is  once  more 
preached  in  Geneva !" 

For  preaching  such  orthodox  views  Malan  was 
finally  deposed  from  the  ministry  and  built  a  chapel 
of  his  own — the  Chapel  of  the  Testimony.  He 
joined  the  Presbyterian  Church  of  Scotland.  A 
very  beautiful  story  of  his  life  is  his  conversion  of 
Charlotte  Elliot.  As  an  evangelist,  he  often  visited 
the  British  Isles,  and  while  in  England,  he  met 
Charlotte  Elliot  and  asked  her  whether  she  was  a 
Christian.  She  resented  the  question  and  went  on 
with  her  worldly  gayety.  But  her  soul  was  not  at 
rest.  Finally  under  conviction,  she  asked  the  way 
of  life  and  he  pointed  her  to  the  Lamb  of  God. 
"What,"  she  said,  "I,  a  sinful  creature,  come  to 
Him !"  "Yes,"  he  replied,  "God  wants  you  to 
come  just  as  you  are."     She  came  to  God  just  as 


Geneva  Since  Calvin's  Time.  135 

she  was  and  wrote  her  famous  hymn,  based  on  these 
words  of  Malan, — 

Just  as  I  am,  without  one  plea, 
But  that  thy  blood   was   shed  for   me, 
And  that  thou  bidst  me  come  to  thee, 
O  Lamb  of  God,  I  come. 

Lasting,  yes,  eternal  are  the  results  of  religious 
work !  Let  us,  before  we  leave  it,  connect  the  links 
of  this  remarkable  story.  A  sailor  caused  the  con- 
version of  Haldane,  and  he,  in  turn,  his  brother's 
conversion.  Haldane  at  Geneva,  led  to  Malan's 
conversion,  who  in  turn  brought  Charlotte  Elliot 
to  Christ,  and  God  alone  knows  how  many  hun- 
dreds, perhaps  thousands  of  souls  have  been  saved 
for  Jesus  by  the  words  of  her  hymn.  Who  can 
measure  the  results  of  a  single  testimony  for 
Christ?  That  sailor  never  knew  what  he  was 
doing  when  he  rebuked  his  sea-captain.  Eternity 
alone  will  reveal  the  results.  But  what  a  contrast 
just  here  between  Voltaire,  trying  to  uproot  Chris- 
tianity at  Geneva,  and  Haldane  a  half  century  later, 
bringing  it  back ! 

As  a  result  of  this  revival  the  few  evangelicals  at 
Geneva,  were  forced  out  of  the  national  church  and 


136    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

organized  themselves  into  a  church  at  the  Bourg 
du  Four.  Fortunately  for  them,  in  the  midst  of 
their  persecution,  a  wealthy  Englishman,  Mr. 
Drummond,  came  just  as  Haldane  left.  He  aided 
them  financially  and  encouraged  them  in  their  pov- 
erty. The  Genevese  could  not  understand  this  in- 
vasion of  foreigners,  for  no  less  than  four  English- 
men, of  whom  Haldane  was  the  second,  happened 
to  come  to  Geneva,  one  after  the  other,  and  aid  this 
movement.  As  a  result,  the  evangelical  views  grew 
in  influence.  The  Free  Church  of  Geneva  was 
founded  by  these  evangelicals  and  grew  until 
in  1832  a  Theological  Seminary  was  opened 
at  Geneva  which  was  evangelical.  It  called,  among 
other  professors,  Merle  D'Aubigne  as  professor  of 
church  history  and  Gaussen,  also  an  evangelical 
pastor,  as  professor  of  theology.  This  seminary 
still  exists  and  has  exerted  a  very  blessed  influence 
for  the  truth  at  Geneva. 

Finally  a  reaction  began  to  appear  in  the  national 
Church  of  Geneva,  especially  through  the  influence 
of  the  teachings  of  Vinet  of  Lausanne.  The  Ven- 
erable Company  of  Pastors  became  more  evangel- 
ical, until  it  is  said  (<that  now  the  majority  are 
evangelical."     A  young  preacher  of  great  power 


Geneva  Since  Calvin's  Time.  137 

has  arisen,  named  Thomas,  who  is  "Calvin  redivi- 
vus"  (Calvin  resurrected).  When  he  preaches,  at 
the  cathedral,  it  is  crowded  to  the  doors.  He  at- 
tempted to  leaven  that  church  with  the  Gospel,  but 
finding  the  church  too  inert  and  slow,  he  left  it, 
but  kept  on  preaching".  But  Geneva  in  1908  voted 
to  separate  the  Church  from  the  state,  and  he  has 
ii(  iw  returned  to  the  old  church  and  will  probably 
do  much  to  awaken  it  by  his  evangelistic  preaching 
and  aggressive  methods.  As  both  the  National  and 
the  Free  Churches  of  Geneva  are  now  separated 
from  the  state,  they  are  coming  closer  together. 
n>ut  it  is  a  sad  fact  that  Geneva,  which  used  to  be 
the  Gibraltar  of  Protestantism  is  now  becoming 
Catholic  in  population,  not  by  losses  from  Protest- 
ants to  Catholics,  but  by  the  influx  of  immigrants 
from  Savoy  and  Italy.  .However  Catholicism  in 
Switzerland  is  more  liberal  than  in  other  parts  of 
Europe  and  Protestantism  will  remain  there  as  the 
safeq;uard  of  the  citv  of  Calvin. 


Chapter  X.— LAUSANNE  AND  CANTON 
VAUD. 

ONE  more  famous  city  remains  to  be  men- 
tioned in  Switzerland,  that  birth-place  of 
the  Reformation — Lausanne.  It  is  beau- 
tifully located  on  rapidly  rising  ground  just  above 
the  northwestern  corner  of  Lake  Geneva  and  about 
a  mile  away  from  it.  It  commands  a  fine  view 
southward  and  eastward  up  and  down  Lake  Gen- 
eva, and  of  the  snow-capped  Alps  beyond.  It  is 
an  aristocratic  city  with  a  population  of  60,000, 
thus  making  it  one  of  the  large  cities  of  Switzer- 
land. Its  small,  but  simple,  cathedral  is  very  beau- 
tiful, and  is  famous  as  the  place  of  the  disputation 
in  1536. 

In  the  early  part  of  the  reformation,  this  district 
belonged  to  the  Duke  of  Savoy  and  was  therefore 
Catholic.  But  it  was  conquered  at  that  time  by 
Bern,  who  began  filling  it  with  refugees  from 
France,  so  as  to  form  a  buffer-state  against  Savoy. 
At  first  there  were  but  a  few  of  Reformed.  But 
the  disputation  at  Lousanne  in  1536,  at  which  Cal- 
vin greatly  distinguished  himself  by  his  learning 
139 


140    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

and  eloquence,  together  with  the  influx  of  French 
immigrants  gradually  made  it  Protestant.  The 
early  reformer  of  Lausanne  was  Peter  Viret,  the 
third  of  the  trio  of  reformers  of  French  Switzer- 
land, Calvin  and  Farel  being  the  other  two.  Viret 
may  be  styled  the  boy-preacher  of  the  reformation, 
for  he  began  preaching  so  young.  He  was  the 
youngest  of  the  great  reformers. 

Viret  was  born  (1511),  at  a  country  town  named 
Orbe,  about  twenty  miles  west  of  Lausanne.  He 
went  to  Paris  to  study  for  the  priesthood,  but  there 
came  into  contact  with  the  Protestant  doctrines 
under  Lefevre,  the  earliest  of  the  reformers.  Hav- 
ing given  up  his  popish  views,  he  also  gave  up  his 
purpose  to  become  a  priest,  and  returned  to  his  na- 
tive Switzerland.  Meanwhile  a  change  similar  to 
his  own,  had  been  taking  place  in  his  native  town. 
As  we  have  seen,  Farel,  that  fiery  reformer,  had 
wandered  into  the  town,  and  put  to  flight  a  seller 
of  indulgences  and  had  begun  to  organize  a  little 
congregation  in  the  town.  When  the  Catholics  op- 
posed his  preaching,  the  Bern  government  protect- 
ed him.  Farel  preached  in  the  great  church  at 
Orbe,  which  holds  many  hundreds,  but  there  were 
only  three  hearers.        Still  the  number  increased 


Lausanne  and  Canton  Vaud. 


141 


gradually  and  the  return  of  Viret  was  a  great  aid. 
Farel  ordained  Viret  in  1531,  at  the  age  of  twenty. 
— the  youngest  of  the  reformers.  Viret  went  with 
Farel  to  Geneva  where  the  Catholics  tried  to  kill 
the  reformers  by  giving  them  poisoned  soup.  Al- 
though Farel  fortunately  did  not  eat  of  it,  Viret 
did.  He  became  very  sick  but  recovered,  although 
his  thin  face  attests  that  he  remained  a  sort  of  in- 
valid for  the  rest  of  his  life. 

Soon  Lausanne  needed  a  reformer  and  Farel  sent 
Viret  there  in  1536,  as  Bern  was  very  anxious  to 
convert  Lausanne  to  Protestantism.  For  twenty- 
two  years  he  was  pastor  there,  and  the  number  of 
the  Reformed  greatly  increased.  Under  his  patron- 
age a  Reformed  school  was  started,  at  which  Beza 
taught  for  a  time.  But  there  had  been  considerable 
friction  between  Bern  and  the  Genevan  Church,  es- 
pecially about  the  form  of  church  government.  The 
Genevese  claimed  more  freedom  from  the  state 
than  the  Bernese  would  allow.  So  Viret  and  Beza, 
who  sympathized  with  Calvin  and  the  Genevese 
were  dismissed.  Beza  went  to  Geneva  and  Viret 
went  to  France,  called  there  by  Jeanne  D'Albret, 
queen  of  Navarre.  There  he  taught  theology  and 
died  at  Orthez  1571. 


142    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

The  school,  that  Viret  founded,  grew  unto  a  uni- 
versity, having  among  its  professors  some  promi- 
nent men  as  Bucanus,  professor  of  theology  in  the 
sixteenth  century.  But  the  French  population  of 
the  district  of  Vaud  did  not  always  easily  assimilate 
with  the  German  population  of  Bern  north  of  them. 
The  professors  of  theology  were  inclined  to  more 
liberal  views.  While  Bern  clung  to  high  Calvinism, 
this  district  inclined  to  the  low  Calvinism  of  the 
School  of  Saumur.  Bern,  however,  compelled  the 
ministers  and  students  to  sign  the  Helvetic  Con- 
sensus in  1675,  although  constant  efforts  were  made 
to  lower  the  subscription  to  it  as  by  adding  "in 
so  far  as  it  agrees  with  the  Bible,"  or  by  a  promise 
not  to  teach  publicly  anything  contrary  to  the  creed. 
The  efforts  of  Bern  to  force  subscription  caused 
the  breach  between  French  Vaud  and  German  Bern 
to  widen,  until  it  culminated  in  the  revolt  of  Major 
Davel  in  1723.  This  revolt  was  suppressed  and 
Davel  was  executed ;  but  he  has  ever  since  been  the 
idol  of  the  people  of  that  canton.  His  bronze 
statue  is  in  the  university-hall  at  Lausanne  and  its 
cathedral  has  a  tablet  to  his  memory. 

One  of  the  most  interesting  institutions  at  Lau- 
sanne was  the  theological  seminary  founded  there 


Lausanne  and  Canton  Vaud.  143 

by  Anloine  Court,  the  great  preacher  of  the  Hugue- 
not Church  of  France,  when  Reformed  worship 
was  forbidden  in  that  land.  He  was  the  preacher 
to  that  "Church  of  the  desert,"  preaching  secretly 
in  woods  and  caves  and  quarries.  He  has  been 
called  the  "Savior  of  the  Huguenot  Church,"  the 
"second  reformer  of  France,"  Calvin  being  the 
first.  As  the  Huguenot  ministers  of  France  were 
either  dying  off  or  being  put  to  death  at  the  stake, 
it  became  necessary  to  replenish  their  ranks.  To 
found  a  theological  seminary  in  France  was  out 
of  the  question  as  the  Huguenot  faith  was  pro- 
scribed. So  Court  founded  it  at  Lausanne,  and 
from  1 728-1 788  it  sent  out  188  young  men.  They 
went  back  to  France  to  preach  in  caves  and  woods, 
many  of  them  to  suffer  martyrdom.  By  this  the- 
ological seminary,  Lausanne  saved  the  Reformed 
Church  of  France,  which  it  supplied  with  ministers. 
In  the  latter  part  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
under  the  French  dominion,  Vaud  was  separated 
from  Bern  and  became  a  separate  canton,  much  to 
the  joy  of  its  inhabitants.  In  the  early  part  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  the  Church  of  Vaud  was  ortho- 
dox and  looked  upon  the  neighboring  Church  at 
Geneva  with  suspicion  because  of  its  Socinianism. 


144    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

But  there  was  a  good  deal  of  dead  orthodoxy  and 
opposition  to  evangelistic  movements.  With  the 
uprising  of  the  worldly  party  in  political  matters  in 
1839,  a  breach  was  begun  between  Church  and 
state,  when  the  state  took  away  subscription  to  the 
Second  Helvetic  Confession.  From  that  time  the 
friction  continued  up  to  1845,  when  a  crisis  occur- 
red. The  state,  after  the  old  custom,  ordered  the 
ministers  to  read  a  proclamation,  which  was  purely 
political,  from  their  pulpits.  Forty-one  of  the  min- 
isters refused  to  do  it,  as  it  did  not  concern  reli- 
gious things.  The  state  ordered  their  punishment, 
while  the  classes  (the  religious  bodies),  to  which 
they  belonged,  sustained  them  in  their  position.  So 
the  state  council  proceeded  to  punish  them.  As  a 
result  153  ministers  declared  their  separation  from 
the  National  Church  and  only  89  remained  in  it. 
On  March  12,  1847,  those  who  separated  founded 
the  Free  Church  of  Vaud  with  35  congregations. 

The  leading  theologian  of  the  Free  Church  was 
Alexander  Vinet.  He  was  a  native  of  Ouchy,  the 
port  of  Lausanne  on  Lake  Geneva.  He  was  born 
in  1797.  He  had  been  professor  at  Basle  for  many 
years  where  he  gained  great  fame  in  French  litera- 
ture.   As  early  as  1826,  he  had  written  a  pamphlet 


Lausanne  and  Canton  Vaud.  145 

on  "Liberty  of  Worship."  He  emphasized  con- 
science in  all  his  works,  so  that  all  his  theological 
writings  tend  to  the  ethical.  He  claimed  that  con- 
science could  not  be  forced  and  therefore  he  taught 
its  liberty.  He  was  a  very  stimulating  thinker  and 
exerted  a  great  influence  on  the  French  on  the- 
ological questions, — so  great,  that  he  has  been  called 
the  French  Schliermacher.  He  returned  to  Lau- 
sanne from  Basle,  just  before  the  storm  broke,  to 
become  professor  there.  He  then  entered  the  Free 
Church  of  Vaud,  but  did  not  live  long  after  its 
formation.  But  his  love  for  religious  liberty  and 
his  great  influence  helped  to  crystalize  this  move- 
ment toward  a  Free  Church. 

With  these  pastors  the  National  Church  lost  the 
most  spiritual  and  aggressive  element  of  the 
Church.  The  Free  Church,  though  small  in  num- 
bers, became  a  very  active  body  and  founded  at 
Lausanne  a  new  theological  school.  About  thirty 
years  ago,  the  Ritschlian  theology  of  Germany 
found  an  entrance  into  it,  especially  under  Prof. 
Astie,  which  caused  a  good  deal  of  controversy.  It 
unfortunately  destroyed  much  of  the  confidence 
that  was  felt  in  the  Free  Church  as  being  a  bul- 
wark against  heterodoxy.     Still  the  Free  Church 


146    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

has  been  more  evangelical  than  the  National  Church 
of  Vaud  and  has  done  a  fine  religious  work. 

Among  the  most  important  movements  of  the 
Free  Church  of  Vaud  was  the  organization  of  a 
Foreign  Missionary  Society.  In  Europe,  in  most 
of  the  churches,  the  Foreign  Missionary  Societies 
are  not  originally  a  part  of  the  church,  as  with  us 
in  America.  They  are  usually  voluntary  organiza- 
tions, independent  of  the  church.  So  that  this  act 
of  the  Free  Church  in  organizing  its  own  mission- 
ary society  marked  a  new  step  forward.  It  came 
about  in  this  way.  In  1869  at  the  synod  held  at 
Lausanne,  a  communication  was  received  from 
two  of  the  students  of  its  theological  school  at  Lau- 
sanne, Paul  Berthoud  and  Ernst  Creux,  asking  the 
Free  Church  to  start  its  own  mission  to  the  heathen 
and  offering  themselves  as  missionaries.  The 
synod  was  deeply  moved  by  their  appeal,  but  it 
felt  it  was  too  small  a  body  to  undertake  so  great 
a  work.  So  it  hesitated.  But  the  Paris  Missionary 
Society,  whose  mission  was  to  the  Basutoes  in 
South  Africa,  sent  word  that  they  could  use  the 
young  men.  So  in  1872  these  young  men  went  to 
South  Africa  under  that  society.  In  1874  the  Free 
Church  of  Vaud  decided  to  undertake  the  support 


Lausanne  and  Canton  Vaud.  147 

of  its  own  mission  in  South  Africa  at  Spelonka, 
in  the  northern  part  of  the  Transvaal,  and  sent 
these  missionaries  there.  They  found  great  diffi- 
culties especially  in  the  language  and  the  morals 
of  the  people.  The  blacks  were  under  the  power 
of  their  medicine-men.  But  the  missionaries  push- 
ed forward  their  work  and  soon  about  one-fortieth 
of  the  people  attended  worship  and  a  few  became 
catechumens  or  seekers.  Then,  however,  the  Trans- 
vaal government  turned  against  the  missionaries 
and  forbade  their  preaching  to  the  blacks.  The 
missionaries  protested  and  finally  were  imprisoned 
in  1876  at  Marabasted.  To  make  matters  worse, 
war  broke  out  near  Spelonken  during  their  absence 
and  their  wives  were  left  without  any  protection. 
But  God  took  care  of  them.  After  a  month's  im- 
prisonment the  missionaries  were  released,  and  a 
month  after  their  return  had  their  first  baptism,  and 
in  two  years,  there  were  forty  converts.  In  1883 
the  Free  Churches  of  the  other  two  French  can- 
tons, Neuchatel  and  Geneva,  united  with  the  Free 
Church  of  Vaud,  in  the  support  of  this  mission, 
which  enabled  them  to  enlarge  its  work.  It  now 
took  the  name  of  the  Mission  Romande  and  its  of- 
fice is  at  Lausanne. 


148    famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

An  interesting  mission  of  this  society  is  at  Dela- 
goa  Bay,  started  1882.  Delagoa  Bay  has  often 
been  called  the  "White  Man's  Grave,"  because  of 
the  deadliness  of  its  climate.  This  mission  was 
started  by  the  converted  blacks  of  the  mission,  and 
its  expenses  born  by  them.  A  native  missionary 
was  placed  there  and  Berthoud  occasionally  visited 
it,  as  he  dared  not  live  there  on  account  of  the  cli- 
mate. A  great  revival  broke  out.  By  1888,  300 
had  united  with  the  Church.  At  the  25th  anniver- 
sary of  this  society  in  1898,  its  secretary,  Mr. 
Grandjean,  who  had  himself  been  a  missionary, 
said,  "Among  the  sheaves,  we  see  many  remarkable 
ones.  At  the  Littoral  we  see  a  number  of  women 
whom  we  call  mothers  in  Israel,  a  Lois,  the  living 
centre  of  those  at  Rikatla  and,  at  Lawrence 
Marque's,  a  Sarah  whose  house,  formerly  a  house 
of  infamy,  became  the  first  place  of  worship.  We 
have  seen  a  great  number  of  men  changed  from 
laziness  to  activity  and  regularity.  We  have  seen 
heathen  chiefs  abandoning  pagan  lives  of  sensual- 
ity and  becoming  Christians,  at  the  risk  of  loosing 
their  positions.  We  have  seen  a  large  number  of 
young  men,  who,  from  being  pagans  have  become 
evangelists.     We  have  seen  transformation  in  the 


Lausanne  and  Canton  Vaud.  149 

family,  in  the  individual,  in  society,  in  the  relation 
between  the  tribes  and  in  the  attitude  of  the  gov- 
ernment." The  statistics  of  this  society  in  1909  re- 
port 2,118  communicants,  155  missionaries  and 
$62,803  income. 


STRASBURG   CATHEDRAL 


BOOK  II.— GERMANY 

Chapter  I.— STRASBURG  AND  ITS  MAJES- 
TIC CATHEDRAL. 

THE  first  place  in  Germany  where  the  Re- 
formed doctrines  took  root  was  the  city 
of  Strasburg  in  western  Germany,  a  few 
miles  distant  from  the  Rhine.  It  is  to-day  a  large 
city  of  about  175,000  inhabitants.  It  was  originally 
a  part  of  Germany,  but  was  captured  by  France 
under  Louis  XIV,  and  recaptured  by  the  Germans 
from  France  in  1870.  Under  France  the  city  be- 
came French,  and  since  Germany  has  acquired  it, 
they  have  been  trying  to  make  it  German,  even  for- 
bidding the  teaching  of  French  in  the  public 
schools,  much  to  the  disgust  of  the  inhabitants. 
Still  since  1870  a  great  many  Germans  have  moved 
in,  and  the  city  by  this  time  has  become  pretty  well 
Germanized.  Germany  always  keeps  a  large  gar- 
rison of  soldiers  there,  as  it  is  the  citadel  of  south- 
western Germany  and  she  will  never  permit  France 
to  have  any  chance  to  retake  it.  It  has  almost  im- 
pregnable fortifications  and  the  German  soldiers, 
I5i 


152    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

of  whom  there  are  15,000  in  the  city,  are  every- 
where in  evidence. 

Strasburg  is  a  quaint  old-fashioned  city,  its 
houses  having  steep  roofs,  meeting  at  a  peak  and 
surmounted  on  top  by  a  tall  chimney.  On  many 
of  the  chimneys  is  a  stork's  nest,  with  perhaps  one 
of  these  white  birds  sitting  or  standing  thereon  on 
one  leg.  These  storks  look  like  the  white  watchmen 
over  the  city.  And  while  the  German  soldiers 
watch  the  city  below,  these  birds  of  peace,  like  si- 
lent sentinels  watch  it  above.  The  storks  go  away 
in  winter  to  warmer  climates  but  return  every 
spring  to  the  same  nest.  It  is  considered  good  luck 
to  have  a  stork's  nest  on  the  house. 

There  are  many  interesting  sights  in  Strasburg. 
Sometimes  the  visitor  in  walking  along  the  streets, 
will  catch  a  glimpse  of  a  woman  with  an  Alsatian 
headdress — a  large  black  bow  tied  on  top  of  the 
head,  whose  ends  flap  up  and  down  like  kites  while 
she  walks. 

The  most  important  edifice  in  Strasburg  is  the 
cathedral,  a  large  building  covering  a  square  of 
ground.  It  has  two  towers  in  front,  but  only  one 
of  them  is  capped  by  a  spire,  which  rises  up  like 
a  tall  gigantic  stone  needle,  piercing  the  heavens. 


Strasburg  and  Its  Majestic  Cathedral.       153 

It  is  one  of  the  highest  spires  in  Europe,  465  feet 
above  the  ground.  The  distance  from  the  roof  of 
the  cathedral  to  the  top  of  the  spire  is  200  feet,  but 
the  view  from  the  roof  is  fine.  Over  the  wedge- 
shaped  roofs  and  storks'  nests  on  the  chimneys,  can 
be  seen  the  flat  plain  around  the  city,  on  the  east  of 
which  flows  the  river  Rhine.  The  interior  of  the 
church  is  imposing.  Its  nave  is  99  feet  high,  and 
the  building  is  135  feet  wide.  In  it  is  the  famous 
Strasburg  clock.  This  is  about  fifty  feet  high  and 
is  very  old,  having  been  begun  in  1352,  and  its  last 
improvement  having  been  made  in  1842.  It  is, 
therefore,  the  growth  of  centuries  of  inventions 
and  has  become  a  wonder  in  mechanism.  On  its 
first  gallery  an  angel  strikes  on  a  bell  in  his  hand, 
while  a  spirit  by  his  side  reverses  the  hour-glass. 
Over  him  is  a  skeleton  who  shakes  the  hours. 
Around  are  allegorical  figures,  representing  youth, 
manhood  and  old  age.  The  clock  goes  through  its 
performance  only  at  noon.  Then  the  twelve  apos- 
tles move  around  the  figure  of  Christ.  On  the 
highest  pinnacle  is  perched  a  rooster  which  flaps 
his  wings,  stretches  his  neck  and  crows,  awakening 
the  echoes  to  the  remotest  part  of  the  cathedral. 
The    clock    in    a    wonderful    way    regulates    itself, 


154    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

adapting  itself  to  the  different  seasons  for  an  al- 
most unlimited  number  of  years. 

But  this  cathedral  takes  us  back  to  the  reforma- 
tion. Though  Strasburg  is  now  Catholic,  it  was 
Reformed  in  the  reformation  for  many  years.  Its 
St.  Lawrence  chapel  was  the  birth-place  of  the  Re- 
formed religion  in  Strasburg.  There  Matthew  Zell, 
one  of  the  early  reformers  of  Strasburg  began 
preaching  Protestantism  in  1521  by  expounding  the 
epistle  to  the  Romans,  that  citadel  of  Protestantism, 
which  so  clearly  teaches  justification  by  faith,  over 
against  justification  by  works  as  taught  by  the 
Catholics.  This  side-chapel  soon  became  too  small 
for  the  crowds,  that  gathered  to  hear  the  new  Gos- 
pel, so  Zell  began  preaching  in  the  great  cathedral. 
As  the  Catholic  bishop  forbade  the  preaching  of 
such  doctrines  in  the  pulpit  of  the  cathedral,  that 
difficulty  was  easily  overcome,  for  the  carpenters 
of  the  neighboring  street  made  a  portable  pulpit, 
which  was  carried  into  the  church  from  which  Zell 
might  preach  and  it  was  taken  out  after  he  was 
done.  Zell  was  greatly  aided  by  his  wife  whom 
he  married  1525.  Under  her  care  his  house  became 
an  asylum  for  all  persecuted  refugees.  On  one  oc- 
casion they  received  as  many  as  eighty  into  their 


Strasburg  and  Its  Majestic  Cathedral.       155 

house.  She  was  not  only  a  great  house-mother, 
but  also  a  literary  character.  She  had  a  large  cor- 
respondence and  wrote  a  book  to  defend  the  Re- 
formed doctrines.  Zell  was  soon  joined  in  1523 
by  two  other  men,  who  became  with  him  the  re- 
formers of  Strasburg,  Capito  and  Bucer,  the  latter 
becoming  the  leader. 

Martin  Bucer  came  to  Zell's  house  as  a  refugee 
and  his  wife  made  him  welcome.  Zell  loaned 
Bucer  his  pulpit  so  he  could  preach  in  the  cathe- 
dral. One  day  when  he  was  preaching  in  the  chapel 
of  St.  Lawrence  the  monks  went  into  the  choir  of 
the  cathedral  and  began  singing  their  Latin  ser- 
vices, intending  to  drown  his  voice  in  preaching. 
It  was  singing  against  preaching,  Catholicism 
against  Protestantism.  Bucer's  hearers  were  great- 
ly enraged  at  this  interruption.  After  expostulat- 
ing with  the  monks,  they  were  about  ejecting  them 
from  the  choir,  when,  as  a  riot  threatened,  the  city 
authorities  intervened.  This  crisis,  however, 
brought  the  matter  before  the  city  council,  who  de- 
cided in  favor  of  the  Reformed  and  Bucer  was 
given  the  St.  Aurelian's  Church  to  preach  in,  where 
he  was  pastor  (1 524-1 531)  when  he  became  pastor 
of  St.  Thomas.     It  happened  that  the  St.  Aurelian 


156    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Church  contained  the  body  of  a  certain  saint,  fa- 
mous for  his  cures.  Bucer  preached  so  strongly 
against  this  superstition  that  the  saint's  body  was 
taken  out  and  by  1529  the  reformers  had  secured 
the  abolition  of  the  mass. 

With  Bucer,  labored  the  other  Strasburg  reform- 
ers, Capito  and  Hedio.  Bucer  was  the  great  peace- 
maker in  the  Church  of  the  sixteenth  century. 
Luther  and  Zwingli  had  gotten  into  a  great  con- 
troversy over  the  doctrine  of  the  Lord's  Supper. 
Bucer  tried  to  heal  the  difference.  Bucer  was  there- 
fore often  rated  by  the  Swiss  as  a  follower  of 
Luther  and  by  the  Lutherans  as  a  follower  of 
Zwingli.  His  efforts  brought  Strasburg  into  close 
political  relations  with  Zurich.  When  the  confer- 
ence was  held  at  Marburg  in  1529,  where  all  the 
leading  reformers  met,  Bucer  went  there  as  the  ad- 
herent of  Zwingli.  Zwingli  and  Ecolampadius 
passed  through  Strasburg  on  their  way  to  Mar- 
burg. They  stayed  twelve  days  and  preached  to 
great  crowds.  As  a  result  of  this  close  intimacy  of 
Bucer  with  the  Swiss,  he  was  not  permitted  by  the 
Lutherans  to  sign  the  Augsburg  Confession,  when 
it  was  presented  to  the  Emperor  at  the  German  diet 
of  1530.     So  Bucer  prepared  another  Confession, 


Strasburg  and  Its  Majestic  Cathedral.       157 

the  Confession  of  the  Four  Cities,  the  other  cities 
(beside  Strasburg)  that  signed  it  being  Constance, 
Lindau  and  Memmingen.  Later  Bucer  was  very 
active  in  the  cause  of  union.  He  succeeded  in  get- 
ting Luther  to  agree  to  the  Wittenberg  Concord 
in  1536,  and  went  to  Switzerland  to  try  to  get  the 
Swiss  to  agree  to  it.  He  thus  hoped  to  bring  the 
Lutheran  and  Reformed  Churches  together.  But 
the  Swiss  did  not  accept  it.  And  although  it  pre- 
vented Luther  from  controversy  for  years,  the  lat- 
ter finally  broke  out  again  against  Zwingli.  But 
Bucer  kept  the  peace  for  many  years. 

To  the  city  of  Strasburg  came  also  John  Calvin 
in  1538,  driven  out  of  Geneva.  He  was  given 
charge  of  the  newly  organized  French  Church 
there,  composed  of  refugees  from  France,  for  Stras- 
burg was  at  that  time  German.  At  first  his  con- 
gregation worshipped  in  the  Church  of  the  Domin- 
icans, but  afterwards  the  Church  of  St.  Nicolas 
near  the  111  river  was  given  to  them.  Calvin  here 
revealed  his  remarkable  executive  power,  for  he 
thoroughly  organized  the  Church  according  to  the 
Presbyterial  order.  He  also  introduced  a  French 
liturgy  based  on  Farel's  and  Bucer's,  which  after- 
wards became  the  model  on  which  the  later  Gene- 


158    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

van  liturgy  was  based.  Strange  to  say  the  only 
copy  in  existence  is  said  to  have  been  destroyed  in 
the  seige  of  Strasburg  in  1870.  But  Calvin  was 
not  only  a  pastor,  but  also  a  teacher.  He  gave 
lectures  on  the  different  books  of  the  Bible.  He 
thus  became  also  the  great  exegete  and  commenta- 
tor of  the  reformation.  For  this  his  rare  scholar- 
ship and  fine  judicial  mind  thoroughly  prepared 
him.  At  Strasburg  he  also  found  a  wife  in  Idelette 
Van  Buren.  And  in  his  newly  formed  home,  we 
get  a  new  glimpse  of  this  great  intellectual  genius, 
as  a  man  of  deep  affection,  large  heart,  deep  sym- 
pathy and  strong  social  ties. 

Calvin's  stay  at  Strasburg  was  also  important  in 
another  respect.  It  brought  him  into  contact  with 
the  reformers  of  Germany.  Calvin  was  a  French- 
man and  naturally  viewed  things  from  that  stand- 
point. But  his  vision  was  broadened  here  by  con- 
tact with  the  reformers  of  Germany.  He  was  thus 
prepared  to  become  a  universal  reformer,  with  sym- 
pathies which  reached  far  beyond  his  city  or  his 
own  country.  For  Calvin,  later  reveals  a  grasp  and 
sympathy  as  wide  as  the  then  known  world.  Cal- 
vin became  a  cosmopolitan  as  his  later  correspond- 
ence shows.    His  stay  at  Strasburg  was  not  merely 


Strasburg  and  Its  Majestic  Cathedral.       159 

of  very  great  value  to  himself,  in  broadening  him 
but  also  of  great  importance  to  the  reformers  of 
Germany.  For  he  happened  to  be  there  at  a  criti- 
cal time  for  them.  The  Catholics  were  making 
every  effort  by  conferences  and  diets  to  win  back 
the  Protestants.  And  Melancthon,  who  seemed  to 
be  the  leader  of  the  Protestants,  was  inclined  to  be 
yielding.  iThen  it  was  that  Calvin  appeared  to  up- 
hold the  Protestants.  By  his  great  ability  as  a 
statesman,  he  commanded  attention  at  these  diets 
and  won  respect.  In  them,  too,  he  formed  a  very, 
close  friendship  for  Melancthon.  This  was  the 
more  remarkable  because  they  represented  different 
churches  which  before  had  been  in  controversy,  and 
because  they  were  so  different  in  dispositions.  This 
friendship  continued  until  the  death  of  Melancthon. 
Calvin,  however,  was  recalled  from  Strasburg  to 
Geneva  in  1541. 

After  Calvin's  departure,  a  strong  Lutheran  re- 
action began  in  Strasburg  under  Marbach,  one  of 
the  ministers.  He  insisted  on  the  introduction  of 
Luther's  catechism  and  of  Lutheran  doctrines  and 
rites.  Bucer  had  left  for  England  in  1549,  where 
he  died  at  Cambridge  in  1551.  However  Prof. 
John  Sturm,  the  great  teacher  of  western  Germany, 


i6o     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

remained.  He  was  so  famous  that  Melancthon  and 
he  were  called  the  "two  eyes  of  Germany."  Sturm 
was  a  strong  defender  of  the  Reformed.  When 
Peter  Martyr  came  back  from  England,  the  city 
under  Marbach's  influence  demanded  of  him  to 
sign  the  Augsburg  Confession,  whereas  the  Con- 
fession of  the  Four  Cities  had  previously  been 
Strasburg's  creed.  Zanchius  the  Italian  reformer 
also  was  required  to  do  the  same  thing,  when  he 
entered  the  service  of  the  Church  at  Strasburg. 
He,  however,  aided  by  Prof.  Sturm,  boldly  de- 
fended the  Reformed  doctrines.  He  was  a  man 
of  great  ability,  being  one  of  the  leading  theolog- 
ians of  his  age.  He  also  was  compelled  to  leave. 
And  finally  the  Lutherans  drove  Sturm  from  the 
rectorship  of  the  university,  where  he  had  taught 
for  forty  years.  Zanchius  became  professor  of 
theology  at  Heidelberg,  an  assistant  to  Ursinus, 
one  of  the  authors  of  the  Heidelberg  catechism. 
When  Sturm  died,  the  Reformed  were  forbidden 
to  worship  in  Strasburg  and  compelled  to  worship 
at  Wolfisheim  (where  the  fort  Prince  Bismark 
now  is  located).  No  Reformed  worship  was  per- 
mitted in  the  city  for  two  hundred  years,  until  in 
1789  it  was  again  allowed. 


Strasburg  and  Its  Majestic  Cathedral.       161 

But  in  the  meantime  not  only  were  the  Reformed 
driven  out,  but  the  Lutherans  lost  their  hold  as  the 
city  was  taken  by  the  king  of  France.  The  great 
cathedral  was  given  back  to  the  Catholics  and  is 
Catholic  to-day.  Through  all  these  changes,  the 
Reformed  Church  has  continued  to  exist,  not  only 
in  Strasburg  but  in  the  neighboring  region  of  Al- 
sace-Lorraine to  which  it  belongs.  The  Reformed 
church  of  Alsace-Lorraine  now  numbers  about  50,- 
000  adherents.  It  is  being  daily  increased  by  Ger- 
mans moving  thither,  many  of  them  from  the 
Lmited  or  Evangelical  church  of  Germany, 
so-called  because  it  is  the  union  of  the  Luth- 
eran and  Reformed  Churches.  They  have  been 
trying  to  get  the  Reformed  Church  there  to  join 
it  but  have  not  succeeded  as  yet.  The  Church  is 
regularly  organized  under  a  consistory,  at  whose 
head  is  Rev.  Mr.  Piepenbring.  The  French  Re- 
formed congregation  is  still  in  existence,  located 
at  No.  4  Schildgasse  and  remains  as  the  memorial 
of  Calvin.  The  university  also  has  in  it  one  profes- 
sor who  is  Reformed ;  at  present  the  Reformed  pro- 
fessor is  Prof.  Smend. 

During  the  eighteenth  century,  a  very  interest- 
ing character  in  the  Reformed  Church,  happened 


162    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

to  study  at  Strasburg,  named  Yung  Stilling.  He 
was  born  in  Nassau  Siegen  in  1740  and  studied 
medicine  at  Strasburg  1771.  He  later  became 
prominent  in  German  literature,  but  was  also  a  stiff 
adherent  of  evangelical  religion,  in  an  age  when 
rationalism  seemed  to  have  everything  under  its 
sway.  When  he  arrived  at  Strasburg  to  study  he 
had  not  a  dollar  in  money.  He  was,  however,  a 
man  of  great  faith  in  God  and  he  laid  his  case  be- 
fore the  Almighty.  Just  then  he  met  a  merchant 
from  Frankford,  who  asked  him,  "Where  do  you 
get  money  to  study?"  He  replied,  "I  have  a  rich 
Father  in  heaven."  "How  much  money  have  you?" 
"One  dollar."  "Well,  I  am  one  of  the  Lord's  stew- 
ards," he  replied,  and  handed  Stilling  thirty-three 
dollars.  But  he  had  been  in  Strasburg  but  a  short 
time,  when  his  thirty-three  dollars  had  again  been 
reduced  to  one.  Again  he  prayed  most  earnestly 
and  lo !  his  room-mate  came  with  thirty  dollars  in 
gold.  A  few  months  after  this,  the  time  arrived 
when  he  must  either  pay  his  fee  to  his  professor, 
or  have  his  name  stricken  off  the  lecturer's  list  of 
students.  The  money  had  to  be  paid  by  6  p.  m. 
on  a  Thursday.  He  spent  the  day  in  prayer.  Five 
o'clock  came  and  still  there  was  no  money.     His 


Strasburg  and  Its  Majestic  Cathedral.      163 

anxiety  made  him  break  out  into  prespiration,  and 
his  face  was  wet  with  tears.  Then  there  came  a 
knock.  It  was  the  gentleman  from  whom  he  rent- 
ed his  room,  who  asked  him,  how  much  money  he 
had.  He  told  him.  The  gentleman  returned  with 
forty  dollars  in  gold,  which  was  just  enough  to  pay 
his  fees  at  the  university  and  continue  his  studies. 
He  held  that  prayer  was  the  secret  of  success.  His 
child-like  faith  in  God  was  a  marvel  to  the  sneering 
infidels  of  his  day.  His  most  prominent  works  are 
Theobald,  the  Fanatic  and  his  Autobiography. 


Chapter   II.— HEIDELBERG  AND   ITS 
REFORMATION. 

BUT  Heidelberg,  not  Strasburg,  was  destined 
to  be  the  real  birthplace  of  the  Reformed 
Church  in  Germany.  Next  to  Zurich,  Hei- 
delberg is  the  most  sacred  place  to  the  German  Re- 
formed, as  Geneva  is  to  the  French  and  Edinburgh 
to  the  Scotch.  The  Reformed  doctrines,  driven 
out  of  Strasburg,  found  a  permanent  home  in  Hei- 
delberg. 

Heidelberg  is  one  of  the  most  picturesquely  lo- 
cated towns  in  Germany  and  for  beauty  its  ruined 
castle  is  without  a  rival  on  that  continent.  The 
city  is  located  in  a  long  narrow  valley  along  the 
Necker  river,  and  consists  mainly  of  two  or  three 
parallel  streets,  between  the  river  on  the  north 
and  the  mountain  on  the  south.  At  the  mouth  of 
this  narrow  valley,  the  city  spreads  out  in  the 
shape  of  a  fan,  into  the  new  part  of  the  city  on  the 
south  side  of  the  river  and  into  the  suburb  of  Neu- 
enheim  on  the  north  side  of  the  river.  Above  the 
city  on  the  hill,  to  the  south,  perched  like  an  eagle's 
nest  and  overlooking  it,  is  the  grand  old  ruined 
castle, — its  red  sandstone  towers  being  adorned 
165 


166    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

with  creeping  vines.  Directly  underneath  the  cas- 
tle huddled,  like  chickens  under  the  mother's  wings, 
are  the  houses  of  the  eastern  end  of  the  city. 

The  history  of  Heidelberg  goes  back  to  Roman 
times.  There  is  a  legend  that  an  enchantress, 
named  Jetta,  lived  there  and  that  she  was  killed 
by  a  wolf.  Hence  there  is  east  of  the  castle  up  on 
the  mountain-side  a  place  called  the  Wolfs-spring 
(Wolfesbrunnen).*  The  town  was  originally  set- 
tled by  fishermen  and  sailors,  who  plied  their  trade 
on  the  river  Neckar.  They  built  their  huts  along 
the  river,  where  they  were  joined  by  other  trades. 
Meanwhile  the  prince  of  the  land,  the  Elector  of  the 
Palatinate,  attracted  by  the  great  strength  of  the 
mountain  south  of  Heidelberg  built  a  castle  half- 
way up  the  mountain-side.  It  was  originally  built 
above  its  present  location  at  the  Molkencur.  The 
town  gradually  grew  up  from  the  river,  and  the 
prince  moved  his  castle  down  the  mountain  to  its 
present  location,  so  that  town  and  castle  grew  to- 
gether as  they  are  to-day.  In  the  old  part  of  the 
city,  there  are  three  Protestant  Churches,  the  Holy 


*There  is  an  interesting  novel  based  on  this  legend 
called  "Jetta,"  by  Prof.  Haus-rath,  of  the  university, 
which  has  been  translated  into   English. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  167 

Ghost  Church,  which  was  the  old  parish  Church  of 
the  town,  and  is  located  in  its  centre,  and  the  St. 
Peter's  Church,  which  is  the  university  Church. 
Both  of  these  became  Reformed  in  the  reformation. 
There  is  also  a  third  church,  the  Providence  Church 
further  west  on  the  main  street,  which  was  Luth- 
eran and  was  founded  during  the  Thirty  Years 
war.  All  these  churches,  with  others  in  the  new 
part  of  the  city,  are  now  in  the  United  or  Evangel- 
ical Church  of  Baden,  of  which  duchy  Heidelberg 
is  at  present  a  part. 

The  prince  of  the  Palatinate  (whose  capital  as  at 
Heidelberg),"  was  called  an  Elector,  because  he, 
with  six  others  were  the  highest  princes  of  the 
realm,  and  had  the  right  to  elect  a  new  Emperor, 
when  an  Emperor  died.  And  during  the  interim, 
when  there  was  no  Emperor,  the  empire  was  ruled 
by  the  Elector  of  the  Palatinate  as  the  senior  Elec- 


*There  were  two  Palatinates,  an  Upper  and  a  Lower, 
both  under  this  prince.  The  Upper  Palatinate  was  lo- 
cated in  the  northeastern  part  of  Bavaria,  and  had 
Amberg  for  its  capital.  But  the  main  part  of  the 
Palatinate  was  this  Lower  Palatinate,  which  is  located 
along  the  Rhine  from  Darmstadt  on  the  northeast  to 

Zweibrucken    on    the    southwest;    indeed,    it    extended 

down  the  Rhine  north  of  Mayence. 


168    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

tor.  The  other  Electors  were  of  two  kinds,  the 
spiritual  Electors  being  the  Electors  of  Mayence, 
Treves  and  Cologne,  the  temporal  Electors  being 
the  Electors  of  the  Palatinate,  Saxony,  Bradenburg 
and  later  Bohemia.  At  the  reformation  all  the 
temporal  Electors  became  Protestant,  while  the 
spiritual  Electors  remained  Catholic.  Therefore 
there  was  a  life  and  death  struggle  on  the  part  of 
the  Catholics,  to  retain  the  majority  in  the  Elec- 
torate so  as  to  elect  a  Catholic  Emperor.  Three 
times  the  majority  was  about  to  pass  over  into 
Protestant  hands  in  the  reformation.  Twice  the 
Elector  of  Cologne  became  a  Protestant,  first  when 
Elector  Herman,  and  later  when  Elector  Gebhard 
Truchsess,  became  Protestant.  The  third  time  was 
when  the  Elector  of  the  Palatinate  was  elected  King 
of  Bohemia,  which  would  make  him  hold  two  Elec- 
torates, one  of  the  Palatinate  and  one  of  Bohemia 
and  thus  give  him  two  votes.  To  prevent  this  was 
one  of  the  causes  of  the  awful  Thirty  Years  war; 
for  the  Catholics  were  ready  to  engage  in  a  war 
rather  than  loose  their  majority  in  the  Electorate. 
However,  when  in  1866  Prussia  defeated  Austria 
on  the  battle  of  Sadowa,  and  in  1870  the  German 
empire  was  formed,  Prussia  came  to  the  front  and 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  169 

Germany  no  longer  had  a  Catholic  Emperor  but 
a  Protestant.  What  Protestantism  had  struggled 
for  in  Germany  since  the  reformation  had  then 
come  to  pass. 

The  introduction  of  the  reformation  came  late  at 
Heidelberg.  True  there  had  been  certain  signs  of 
it.  Even  before  the  reformation,  in  the  days  of 
John  Huss,  his  co-laborer  Jerome  of  Prague,  in 
1406,  visited  Heidelberg  and  nailed  theses  on  the 
door  of  the  St.  Peter's  Church  just  as  Luther  did 
on  the  Church  at  Wittenberg  in  1517,  as  a  call  to 
a  disputation  about  the  papacy.  But  the  university 
declared  him  a  heretic,  so  "nobody  heard  him  ex- 
cept the  farmers  and  old  people."  A  century 
passed  away  and  in  the  early  days  of  the  reforma- 
tion, when  Martin  Luther  was  still  a  member  of 
the  Augustinian  order,  he  visited  Heidelberg  in 
1 518.  He  stayed  at  the  Augustinian  cloister.* 
There  he  delivered  an  address,  an  eloquent  discus- 
sion of  the  doctrine  of  justification  by  faith,  which 
produced  a  great  impression  on  South  Germany. 
Some  students,  who  heard  it,  as  Bucer,  later  be- 
came reformers.     But  there  was  no  permanent  re- 


*This  was  located  where  the  university  now  stands. 


170    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

suit.  While  other  parts  of  Germany  became  Prot- 
estant,— the  Palatinate  still  remained  Catholic. 
Nevertheless  Protestant  doctrines  began  to  creep 
in.  And  finally  there  came  a  clap  of  thunder  out 
of  a  clear  sky.  On  the  Sabbath  before  Christmas 
(1545),  just  as  the  priest  was  about  reading  mass 
in  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  the  congregation 
struck  up  a  Protestant  hymn.  It  was  the  then 
celebrated  hymn  of  Paul  Speratus  "Es  ist  das  Heil 
tins  kommen  her,"   translated  thus: 

Salvation  hath  come  down  to  us 

Of  freest  grace  and  love. 

Works  can  not  stand  before  God's  law, 

A  broken  reed  they  prove. 

Faith  looks  to  Jesus  Christ  alone, 

He  must  for  all  our  sins  atone, 

He  is  our  one  Redeemer. 

This  hymn  had  quite  a  history  in  the  days  of  the 
reformation  as  it  was  the  hymn  sung  at  a  number 
of  cities  as  Magdeburg,  when  Protestantism  was 
introduced.  It  is  a  doctrinal  hymn,  which  empha- 
sized justification  by  faith  over  against  justification 
by  works.  The  singing  of  this  hymn  at  Heidel- 
berg led  to  the  introduction  of  Protestantism  into 
the  Palatinate.     Elector  Frederick  II  then  permit- 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  iji 

ted  the  congregation  to  have  its  worship  in  the  Ger- 
man language,  instead  of  in  the  Latin,  as  is  the  cus- 
tom in  the  Catholic  Church.  And  he  also  allowed 
the  priests  to  marry. 

But  Protestantism  was  not  fully  introduced  until 
the  next  Elector,  Otto  Henry,  came  to  the  throne. 
He  was  an  ardent  Protestant,  belonging  to  the  low 
or  liberal  Lutheran  wing  of  the  Lutheran  Church. 
Elector  Otto  Henry  was  a  great  patron  of  learning 
and  art, — thoroughly  imbued  with  the  spirit  of  the 
Renaissance.  He  reorganized  and  enlarged  the 
University  of  Heidelberg,  which  was  the  oldest 
university  in  Germany,  saying  he  would  endow  it, 
if  it  took  his  last  dollar.  He  added  to  its  library 
very  valuable  books,  so  that  the  Palatinate  library 
became  famous.  He  showed  his  love  for  art  in  his 
addition  to  the  castle,  the  Otto-Henry's  Building, 
which  is  one  of  the  finest  specimens  of  the  Renais- 
sance in  Germany.*  The  Otto-Henry  Building 
rises  in  three  stories,  richly  .ornamented  with  va- 
rious sculptures  of  Scripture  characters,  as  Joshua, 
Samson,  etc.,  curiously  mingled  with  heathen  gods, 


*The  Renaissance  was  a  revival  of  the  classic  lan- 
guages, art  and  architecture,  and  came  just  before  the 
reformation. 


172    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

as  Saturn,  Mars  and  Hercules.  There  are  also 
allegorical  figures  of  strength,  justice,  truth,  char- 
ity and  hope  adorning  the  walls.  Even  in  their 
ruined  condition  they  are  impressive ;  what  must 
they  have  been  when  the  building  was  new !  But 
these  improvements  were  cut  short  by  the  early 
death  of  the  Elector.  He  had  considered  his  line 
doomed,  because  his  ancestor  of  the  council  of  Con- 
stance had  led  Huss  to  be  burned,  notwithstanding 
the  safe-conduct  given  by  the  Emperor  to  Huss. 

The  successor  of  Otto  Henry  was  Frederick  III, 
of  another  line,  the  Simmern  line,  in  the  northern 
part  of  the  Palatinate.  He  was  one  of  the  most 
pious  princes  of  that  age  of  pious  princes.  If 
Elector  Frederick  the  Pious,  of  Saxony,  may  be 
called  the  god-father  of  the  Lutheran  Church,  the 
German  saint  of  the  early  reformation,  this  Fred- 
erick III  of  the  Palatinate,  may  be  called  the  god- 
father of  the  Reformed  Church,  the  saint  of  the 
later  reformation.  He  it  was,  who,  finding  so  much 
strife  and  confusion  in  his  territory  on  the  ques- 
tion of  doctrine,  and  the  use  of  catechisms,  ordered 
a  new  catechism  to  be  written,  which  is  known 
from  the  place  of  its  publication  as  the  Heidelberg 
catechism.  He  found  on  his  accession  that  the  church 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  173 

of  the  Palatinate  was  much  divided.  In  form,  it  was 
Lutheran,  but  Otto  Henry  in  enlarging  the  univer- 
sity had  called  several  professors,  who  were  Re- 
formed, as  Boquin  a  professor  of  theology,  and 
Erastus  professor  of  medicine.  On  the  other  hand, 
the  superintendent  or  head  of  the  Church  was  a 
very  narrow,  headstrong  Lutheran  named  Hess- 
huss.  Between  these  two  extremes  there  was  a 
middle  party,  indeed,  two  middle  parties,  the  Me- 
lancthonian  which  shaded  toward  the  Lutheran, 
and  the  Calvinistic,  which  shaded  toward  the  Re- 
formed. The  middle  parties  had  the  most  adher- 
ents, and  it  remained  to  be  seen  which  party  would 
gain  additions.  Hesshuss  was  so  violent  and 
bigoted  that  he  alienated  the  Melancthonians  and 
virtually  drove  them  and  the  Calvinists  like  Bo- 
quin, and  Zwinglians  like  Erastus,  together.  It 
was  only  a  question  of  time  when,  with  so  many 
parties  in  the  Church,  matters  would  come  to  a  cri- 
sis. A  number  of  events  occurred  which  revealed 
the  friction.  We  will  give  only  one.  During  a 
communion  service  in  the  Church  of  the  Holy 
Ghost  at  Heidelberg,  Hesshuss  snatched  the  cup 
from  Klebitz  saying  that  he  was  unworthy  to  ad- 
minister it  because  he  was  a  Zwinglian  (and  there- 


1/4    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

fore  in  his  eyes  a  heretic).  The  Elector,  wearied 
of  the  strife,  dismissed  them  both  as  the  surest  way 
to  peace.  But  this  was  a  severer  blow  to  the  high 
Lutherans  than  to  the  Reformed,  for  it  deprived 
them  of  their  leader;  while  the  leaders  of  the  Re- 
formed still  remained  in  Erastus  and  Boquin.  Hess- 
huss  went  away,  but,  by  his  headstrong"  disposi- 
tion and  polemic  temper,  was  dismissed  seven  times 
and  finally  died  in  exile. 

In  1560,  when  the  daughter  of  the  Elector  Fred- 
erick III  was  to  be  married  to  the  Duke  of  Saxony, 
there  was  a  conference  at  Heidelberg,  at  which  the 
Reformed  doctrines  were  openly  defended  by  Bo- 
quin and  Erastus.  In  1561  Frederick  went  farther 
and  began  reforming  the  Church  by  introducing  the 
simplicity  of  the  Reformed.  Altars,  baptismal 
fonts,  wafers,  Latin  singing  and  the  worship  of 
pictures  were  set  aside.  The  final  act  of  Frederick 
III  in  going  over  to  the  Reformed  was  his  publica- 
tion, in  1562,  of  a  book  on  "Breadbreaking  at  the 
Communion,"  in  which  he  urged  the  use  of  bread 
instead  of  wafers,  at  the  communion.  Finally,  to 
avoid  the  old  disputes  and  to  bring  the  Church  into 
harmony,  he  ordered  two  of  his  ministers,  Ursinus, 
a  professor  of  theology,  and  Olevianus,  the  super- 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  175 

intendent  of  the  Church,  to  prepare  a  catechism, 
which  they  did.*  It  was  published  early  in  1563, 
with  the  Elector's  sanction  and  is  known  as  the 
Heidelberg  Catechism,  one  of  the  greatest  of  the 
creeds  of  the  Reformed  Church. 

The  authors  of  this  remarkable  book  deserve  spe- 
cial notice.  Zachariah  Ursinus  was  an  East-Ger- 
man. He  was  born  at  Breslau  (1534)  and  studied 
at  the  University  of  Wittenberg  under  Melancthon. 
Even  in  his  student  days  he  had  leanings  toward 
the  Reformed,  which  were  deepened  by  travel. 
After  his  studies  at  Wittenberg  were  over  he  vis- 
ited Switzerland.  But  he  returned  (1558)  to  Bres- 
lau as  teacher  in  the  parochial  school  of  St.  Eliza- 
beth's Church.  At  that  time  the  Lutheran  Church 
was  dividing  into  two  camps,  a  narrow  high-Luth- 
eran party,  led  by  Flacius,  and  a  liberal  or  low- 
Lutheran  party,  led  by  Melancthon.  Ursinus  as 
a  pupil  of  Melancthon,  taught  Melancthon's  views 
of  doctrine,  and  soon  called  down  upon  his  head 
the  wrath  of  the  high  Lutherans  of  Breslau.  In- 
deed recent  investigations  reveal  that  their  suspi- 


*For  full  account  of  Elector  Frederick  III,  Ursinus 
and  Olevianus,  see  my  Origin  of  the  Reformed  Church 
of   Germany. 


176    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

cions  of  him  as  departing  from  the  Lutheran  faith 
were  not  groundless.  For  Ursinus'  letters  reveal 
that  already  at  Breslau  he  was  inclining  toward  the 
Reformed  view  though  still  claiming  to  be  a  fol- 
lower of  Melancthon.*  So  he  resigned  at  Breslau. 
But  whither  should  he  go.  He  went  to  Wittenberg 
where  he  would  have  stayed  had  Melancthon  been 
living.  As  Melancthon  was  now  dead,  his  friends 
wanted  him  to  remain.  If  he  had,  he  would  have 
become  the  great  theologian  of  the  Melancthonians. 
For  they  greatly  needed  a  theologian,  being  later 
led  by  a  physician,  Peucer,  the  son-in-law  of  Me- 
lancthon. But  Ursinus  foresaw  the  conflicts  before 
them,  which  finally  sent  Peucer  to  prison  for  his 
views.  So  he  would  not  stay,  but  went  to  Zurich. 
Indeed  many  years  before,  when  he  was  on  a  visit 
to  Zurich,  Fries  had  said  to  him,  that  if  he  ever 
needed  an  asylum,  he  would  find  it  in  Zurich. 
When  he  got  to  Zurich  he  found  that  Peter  Martyr 
had  come  there  to  aid  Bullinger  in  teaching.  Peter 
Martyr  toned  up  the  Calvinism  of  the  Zurich 
Church.  Ursinus  now  restudied  the  doctrine  of 
predestination  in  the  light  of  Scripture  and  passed 


*See   article  "Ursinus,"  in   Houck's  Theological   En- 
cyclopaedia. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  177 

over  entirely  to  the  Reformed  views,  to  which  he 
had  been  so  long  inclining.  Peter  Martyr  was 
called  to  Heidelberg  as  professor,  but  he  declined 
and  recommended  Ursinus,  who  accepted  the  call 
and  went  to  Heidelberg  in  1561.  This  added  a 
powerful  theological  thinker  to  the  ranks  of  the 
Reformed  at  Heidelberg.  There  he  taught  in  the 
university  and  was  head  of  the  College  of  Wisdom, 
which  was  founded  on  the  old  Augustinian  cloister 
for  the  training  of  young  men  for  the  ministry. 

The  other  author  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism, 
Casper  Olevianus,  was  a  west-German,  born  at 
Olewig  near  Treves,  from  which  he*  Latinized  his 
name  into  Olevianus.  Treves,  then  as  now,  was 
the  city  of  the  Holy  Coat,  where  the  Catholics  still 
show,  what  is  reputed  to  be  the  holy  coat  of  Christ.* 


*Treves  is  interesting  for  its  relics  of  the  Roman 
period.  It  had  the  basilica  of  Constantine.  The  old 
Roman  gate  Porta  Nigra  or  Black  Gate,  is  a  three- 
storied  sandstone  structure  about  100  feet  high,  through 
which  are  two  entrances.  It  is  so  old  that  its  blocks 
are  fastened  together,  not  by  mortar,  but  by  iron  bars, 
and  it  is  black  with  age.  It  was  built  in  the  third  cen- 
tury after  Christ.  The  basilica  or  court-house  of 
Constantine  the  Great  is  there,  as  are  also  the  ruins 
of  Roman  baths  and  a  Roman  amphitheatre  half  as 
large  as  the  Colosseum  at  Rome  and  holding  30,000 
people. 


178    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

He  went  to  France  to  study  law  at  the  University 
of  Bourges.  But  while  there,  a  providence  turned 
his  mind  to  the  ministry.  While  walking  along  the 
banks  of  the  river  with  the  son  of  Elector  Freder- 
ick III  of  the  Palatinate,  the  latter  was  tempted  by 
some  students  to  get  into  a  boat  to  cross  the  river. 
But  some  of  the  students  had  been  drinking  wine. 
They  began  rocking  the  boat  so  that  it  was  over- 
turned and  the  prince  thrown  into  the  water  and 
drowned.  Olevianus  saw  his  danger  and  rushed 
into  the  water  to  save  him,  only  to  loose  his  foot- 
ing in  the  muddy  bottom  of  the  river.  As  he  thus 
hung  between  life  and  death,  he  made  a  vow  that 
if  God  would  save  him,  he  would  enter  the  min- 
istry. Just  at  that  time,  a  servant  of  the  prince 
came  rushing  to  the  shore  and,  mistaking  Olevianus 
for  the  prince,  pulled  him  out  of  the  water.  Ole- 
vianus, however,  completed  his  studies  for  law  at 
Bourges,  but  then  went  to  Geneva  to  study  the- 
ology at  the  feet  of  Calvin. 

While  there  he  became  deeply  anxious  for  the 
spiritual  welfare  of  his  native  city  Treves,  which 
was  sunk  in  the  grossest  superstitions  of  Romanism. 
He  tried  to  get  others  to  go  there  and,  finding  no 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  179 

one  ready,  he  went  back  himself.  In  1560  he  be- 
came a  teacher  in  an  endowed  school  at  Treves. 
But  he  soon  began  adding  to  the  course  some  of 
Melancthon's  teachings.  And  on  a  summer  day  in 
1560,  he  boldly  nailed  a  notice  on  the  city-hall,* 
inviting  the  citizens  to  a  religious  disputation  in  his 
school  on  a  Sunday  morning.  To  the  crowd,  who 
came,  he  preached  the  Gospel  of  justification  by 
faith.  This  caused  a  tremendous  sensation,  but 
so  many  members  of  the  city  council  inclined  to 
Protestantism,  that  the  council  gave  him  the  use  of 
a  small  church. f  Nearly  half  of  the  citizens  in- 
clined to  the  Gospel,  which  is  very  remarkable, 
when  we  remember  what  a  hot-bed  of  Catholicism 
Treves  had  been.  But  the  Elector  of  Treves  hear- 
ing of  what  was  taking  place,  came  back  from 
Augsburg  with  an  army.  The  citizens  closed  the 
gates  against  him  but  through  some  of  the  Catholics 
within  the  city  he  finally  got  an  entrance  into  the 
city  and  took  possession  of  it.  He  threw  Olevianus 
into  prison  and  ordered  the  Protestants  to  leave  the 
city.     Then  it  was  that  Elector  Frederick  III  re- 


*Now  the  Red  House  in  the  market. 
fThe;    St.    Jacob's    church    in    the    Fleischgasse,    later    a 
hospital,  now  used  as  dwellings. 


iSo    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

membered  the  friend  of  his  son,  who  had  been 
drowned.  He  had  him  released  and  invited  him 
to  Heidelberg-,  first  as  professor  and  then  as  su- 
perintendent of  his  Church. 

It  happened  at  Treves,  as -afterward  in  France, 
that  the  expulsion  of  so  many  of  its  best  citizens 
checked  the  prosperity  of  the  city,  so  that  it  is 
now  only  a  second-rate  city  of  45,000.  To  celebrate 
this  expulsion  of  the  Protestants,  the  Catholics  held 
a  procession  on  Whitmonday,  called  the  "Olevian 
Procession,"  which  is  still  kept  up.  For  250  years 
no  Protestant  service  was  allowed  in  the  city. 
However  Protestantism  in  the  nineteenth  century 
gained  an  entrance  into  Treves  and  there  are  now 
about  3,500  adherents  there,  who  worship  in  the 
old  basilica  of  Constantine. 

These  were  the  young  men,  the  one  26,  the  other 
28  years  of  age,  who  wrote  the  immortal  Heidel- 
berg Catechism.  But  for  publishing  this  catechism 
a  great  storm  began  gathering  around  the  head  of 
Elector  Frederick  III.  The  Lutherans  conspired 
against  him,  especially  the  Duke  of  Wurtemberg. 
So  a  conference  was  held  at  Maulbronn  in  Wurtem- 
berg near  the  Palatinate  border  April  10,  1564,  but 
it  did  not  bring  them  together.     It  rather  divided 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  181 

them  the  more,  especially  the  new  doctrine  of  ubi- 
quity, which  was  then  becoming  prominent  in  the 
Lutheran  Church,  and  which  the  low-Lutherans 
and  Reformed  rejected. 

Matters  came  to  a  crisis  in  1566,  as  Frederick 
III  was  summoned  to  appear  before  the  diet  at 
Augsburg  in  May,  1566,  to  answer  for  the  publi- 
cation of  his  catechism.*  The  enemies  of  Freder- 
ick looked  upon  the  publication  of  the  Heidelberg 
Catechism  as  an  infringement  of  German  law,  which 
permitted  Protestantism  only  in  the  Augsburg  con- 
fession and  Lutheranism.  When  Frederick  left 
Heidelberg  to  go  to  the  diet,  many  of  his  people 
expected  he  would  be  deposed,  indeed  many  never 
expected  again  to  see  him  alive,  and  indeed  a 
rumor  of  his  death  reached  Heidelberg,  which  for- 
tunately proved  untrue.  When  called  before  the 
diet,  he  entered  the  room,  his  son  John  Casimir 
carrying  a  Bible  for  him.  In  a  most  eloquent  ad- 
dress he  declared  that  if  they  would  prove  his  cate- 
chism to  be  not  in  accord  with  the  Bible,  he  would 


*The  diet  met  in  the  palace  of  the  archbishop,  per- 
haps in  the  very  room  on  the  second  floor  where 
Melancthon  presented  the  Augsburg  Confession  to  the 
Emperor  in   1530. 


182    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

give  it  up.  But  if  it  was  true  to  the  Bible,  he  was 
willing  to  give  up  everything  for  his  Saviour,  who 
had  promised,  "that  whatsoever  we  lose  on  earth 
for  his  sake,  we  should  receive  a  hundredfold  in 
the  life  to  come."  His  address  made  a  profound 
impression  and  one  of  the  listening  princes  said  to 
him,  "Fritz,  you  are  more  pious  than  the  rest  of 
us."  So  his  catechism  was  permitted  to  be  used, 
although  it  and  the  Reformed  Church  did  not  have 
legal  standing  in  Germany,  until  the  end  of  the 
Thirty  Years  war  (1648)  when  the  Reformed  by 
name  were  included  in  the  treaty. 

The  good  Elector  Frederick  III,  having  caused 
the  catechism  to  be  composed  and  having  defended 
it  so  ably,  lived  till  1576,  and  then  was  called  to 
his  fathers,  leaving  a  blessed  heritage  of  faith  to 
those  who  came  after  him.*     Before  leaving  the 


*For  an  interesting  account  of  the  introduction  of 
the  Reformed  faith  into  the  Palatinate,  a  very  instruc- 
tive novel  has  appeared  in  German,  entitled  "Einer  ist 
euer  Meister,"  by  Sigmund  Sturm.  The  name  of  the 
author  is  a  pseudonym  of  Prof.  J.  H.  A.  Ebrard,  the 
great  theologian  and  this  was  the  greatest  of  his 
novels.  We  might  also  add  that  there  is  another 
novel  translated  into  English,  entitled  "Klytia,"  by 
Prof.    Hausrath,    which    describes    the    period    of    the 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Reformation.  183 

Heidelberg  Catechism  we  will  give  a  recent  tribute 
to  it  by  Rev.  Alexander  Smellie  of  Scotland:  "It 
is  warm,  spiritual,  unctional  no  less  than  exact  and 
convincing.  No  one  thinks  of  a  catechism  and  a 
poem  as  having  any  affinity  with  each  other,  yet 
the  Heidelberg  catechism  has  all  the  characteristics 
of  prose-poetry.  The  authors  of  the  Westminster 
catechism  have  chosen  the  objective  method  stating 
truth  in  the  form  of  dogma,  the  writers  of  the  Hei- 
delberg— the  subjective  method,  telling  others  the 
gladness  that  has  touched  and  transfigured  their 
own  souls.  The  books  of  Geneva  and  Westminster 
are  like  statues — accurate,  well-proportioned,  im- 
pressive but  immobile  and  somewhat  cold.  The 
book  of  Heidelberg  is  like  a  living  man.  Some  of 
the  features  of  the  man  may  not  be  so  unerringly 
cut  as  those  of  the  statue  but  it  has  within  him  that 
of  which  it  is  destitute — a  beating  pulse  and  a  quiv- 
ering heart." 


writing  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism.  He  is  unfair 
to  Olevianus  and  the  Reformed,  but  still  it  is  inter- 
esting. 


Chapter  III.— HEIDELBERG  AND  ITS  RUIN- 
ED CASTLE. 

r    I    !  HE  Palatinate  was  destined  to  pass  through 
many  changes.     At  the  death  of  Elector 


1 


Frederick  III,  his  son  Lewis  ascended  the 
throne.  He  was  a  strict  Lutheran.  As  the  German 
law  at  that  time  was  "like  prince,  like  people" 
Lutheranism  was  again  introduced  as  the  religion 
of  the  land  and  the  Reformed  were  driven  out.  But 
the  younger  brother  of  Lewis,  Count  John  Casimir, 
was  strongly  Reformed  and  gave  the  persecuted 
Reformed  an  asylum  in  his  little  territory  at  Neu- 
stadt  on  the  Haardt,  southwest  of  Heidelberg. 
There  he  founded  a  new  Reformed  university.* 
This  university  he  desired  should  take  the  place  of 
the  Heidelberg  University,  which  had  now  been 
made  Lutheran.  He  called  to  it  all  the  Reformed 
professors  of  Heidelberg  except  Olevianus.  Ur- 
sinus,  Zanchius  and  Tremellius  made  this  new  uni- 
versity famous.  These  professors  published  a  Re- 
formed Bible  in  German, — the  Neustadt  Bible. 
There  Ursinus   died   after  a   useful,  laborious  life 


*The   university   building   is    now   used    as   a   school 
building  and  is  called  the  Casimirium. 

185 


186    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

October  12,  1583,  and  was  buried  in  the  choir  of 
the  old  church  at  Neustadt.  Olevianus,  when 
driven  out  of  Heidelberg,  went  to  Herborn  in  Nas- 
sau.* 

But  Elector  Lewis  died  soon  (1583)  and  the  Re- 
formed doctrines  were  reintroduced  by  his  brother 
Count  John  Casimir,  who  became  regent  for  the 
young  prince,  who  later  became  Elector  Frederick 
IV,  and  who  was  Reformed.  Thus  was  fulfilled 
the  prophecy  of  Elector  Frederick  III  when  dying, 
as  he  had  said  "Lewis  will  not  do  it  but  Fritz  will 
do  it."  This  prince  built  for  himself  a  new  wing 
of  the  castle  at  Heidelberg,  named  after  him  the 
"Frederick's  Building."  In  it  was  a  chapel,  and 
under  it  is  to-day  the  famous  tun  of  Heidelberg,  an 
immense  cask,  holding  49,000  gallons.  Under  Fred- 
erick IV,  the  university  became  famous  under 
Pareus,  Tossanus  and  H.  Alting,  as  professors  of 
theology. 

But  darker  times  were  to  come.  The  Protestants 
led  by  Frederick  IV  of  the  Palatinate,  formed  the 
Protestant  Union.  This  led  the  Catholics  to  form 
the  Catholic  League.     It  was  only  a  question  of 


*See  Chapter  IV  of  this  book  for  Herborn. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         187 

time  when  matters  would  come  to  a  crisis  between 
them.  This  occurred  under  the  reign  of  the  next 
Elector  of  the  Palatinate,  Frederick  V,  the  son  of 
Frederick  IV.  This  young  prince  married  the 
daughter  of  King  James  I  of  England.  For  this 
daughter  of  a  king,  he  built  a  new  wing  to  the  cas- 
tle at  Heidelberg  called  the  "English  Building," 
at  the  west  end  of  the  castle,  and  also  laid  out  at 
great  expense,  a  most  beautiful  park  around  the 
castle,  so  beautiful  that  it  is  said  to  have  rivalled 
the  gardens  at  Versailles  near  Paris.  But  in  an 
evil  hour,  Elector  Frederick  V  accepted  the  throne 
of  Bohemia,  which  brought  against  him  all  the 
military  force  of  the  Emperor  Ferdinand  of  Ger- 
many, who  also  claimed  the  throne  of  Bohemia. 
Then  the  Catholic  League  lined  up  against  the 
Protestant  Union.  This  conflict  started  the  awful 
Thirty  Years  war  (1618-48).  After  a  short  reign 
of  a  year  at  Prague,  Frederick  V  was  defeated  at 
the  battle  of  White  Mountain  near  Prague.*  By 
this  defeat  he  lost  not  only  Bohemia,  but  also  his 
hereditary  land  of  the  Palatinate.  He  was  driven 
out  of  Germany  and  became  an  exile  in  Holland. 


*See  Book  III,  Chapter  VI. 


1 88     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

His  land,  the  Palatinate,  was  given  by  the  Em- 
peror of  Germany  to  the  Catholic  Duke  of  Bavaria, 
who  was  made  an  Elector. 

Then  began  a  reign  of  terror  in  the  Palatinate  as 
it  was  overrun  by  Bavarian  and  Spanish  forces. 
Heidelberg  was  captured  in  1622  by  the  Austrians 
under  Tilly,  whose  soldiers  plundered  the  city. 
Prof.  H.  Alting,  one  of  the  Reformed  professors  of 
theology,  started  to  flee  through  the  back  door  of 
his  house,  when  an  Austrian  lieutenant  met  him 
and  said  "I  have  killed  ten  men  to-day.  If  I  knew 
where  Prof.  Alting  was,  he  would  be  the  eleventh." 
But  Prof.  Alting  succeeded  in  escaping.  The  cel- 
ebrated Palatinate  library,  which  Elector  Otto 
Henry  had  done  so  much  to  gather  and  was  one  of 
the  finest  libraries  of  its  day,*  was  carried  away 
and  given  to  the  Pope  of  Rome.  So  bitter  was  the 
feeling  of  the  inhabitants  of  Heidelberg  against 
this  robbery,  that  nobody  would  help  the  Austrians 
pack  it  up  to  be  sent  away  and  the  Austrians  had 
to  get  the  material  for  packing  it  from  Worms  and 
Spire.  The  Pope  and  the  Catholic  powers  howled 
together  for  joy,  that  this  German  Geneva-Heidel- 


^It  was  kept  in  the  church  of  the  Holy  Ghost. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         189 

berg,  the  capital  of  Calvin's  doctrines  in  Germany, 
was  now  under  Catholic  control.  During  this  war, 
the  Reformed  ministers  were  driven  out  and  re- 
placed by  Catholic  priests.  On  May  13,  1627,  all 
the  citizens  of  Heidelberg  were  summoned  to  the 
city-hall  and  commanded  to  return  to  the  Catholic 
Church.  They  refused  to  do  so,  declaring  they 
would  rather  give  up  everything  than  give  up  their 
faith.    Many  emigrated  to  other  lands. 

When  Gustavus  Adolphus  made  his  triumphal 
march  over  Germany,  the  Swedish  troops  recap- 
tured Heidelberg  (1632)  and  the  Reformed  Uni- 
versity was  re-opened.  But  soon  the  death  of 
Gustavus  Adolphus  blasted  the*  hopes  of  the  Re- 
formed, especially  as  their  prince,  Elector  Freder- 
ick A'  died  just  after  Gustavus  Adolphus.  In  1635 
the  Bavarian  army  again  captured  Heidelberg. 
The  Palatinate  now  became  the  theatre  of  opposing 
armies,  who  lived  off  of  the  inhabitants,  one  army 
taking  what  the  other  had  left.  Famine  and  pesti- 
lence followed  close  on  war.  Many  Reformed  emi- 
grated and  many  who  remained  had  to  live  in  mis- 
erable huts.  The  population  so  decreased  that  by 
the  end  of  the  war  there  were  only  200  farmers  in 
all  the  rich  Palatinate.     Indeed  it  was  said,  there 


190    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

were  more  wolves  than  men  around  Heidelberg. 
Finally  peace  came  in  1648,  when  the  Reformed 
were  legally  recognized,  and  the  Palatinate  was 
given  back  to  its  legal  line  of  princes.  Then  the 
son  of  Elector  Frederick  V,  Elector  Charles  Lewis 
was  made  the  Elector.* 

For  forty  years  the  Palatinate  had  peace.  Pros- 
perity returned.  The  Reformed  University  was 
reopened  and  prominent  professors  called  to  it,  as 
Hottinger  and  Fabricius.  The  Reformed  Church 
was  reorganized  and  it  rapidly  recovered  itself,  es- 
pecially as  many  who  had  emigrated  during  the 
war  now  returned.  Elector  Charles  Lewis  died  in 
1680  and  was  succeeded  by  his  son  Charles,  who 
died  in  1685.  However,  during  his  brief  reign,  he 
thoroughly  reorganized  the  Reformed  Church  in 
its  synods  and  classes.  He  aimed  to  be  a  second 
Frederick  III,  as  pious,  as  Puritanic,  as  Reformed. 
Fortunate  it  was  that  the  Church  was  thus  prepared 
for  the  awful  ordeal  before  her. 

Then  began  a  century  of  persecutions  for  the 


*A  very  interesting  story  of  the  sufferings  of  Heidel- 
berg during  the  Thirty  Years  war  is  given  in  English 
in  a  novel  by  Henry  James,  entitled  "Heidelberg." 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         191 

Reformed  of  the  Palatinate.     With  the  death  of 
Charles  a  double  calamity  occurred :  * 

1.  The  ruling  family  of  the  Palatinate  now  be- 
came Catholic  as  Charles  had  left  no  heirs  and  the 
succession  passed  to  another  branch  of  the  family. 

2.  Just  at  that  time,  because  of  this  change  of 
rulers,  King  Louis  XIV,  of  France  laid  claim  to 
the  Palatinate,  because  his  brother,  the  Duke  of 
Orleans,  had  married  Elizabeth  Charlotte  (often 
called  Lize-Lotte),  the  sister  of  the  later  Elector 
Charles.  He  suddenly  precipitated  a  large  army  on 
the  Palatinate  with  the  terrible  command,  "Ravage 
the  Palatinate.  If  the  German  Emperor  wants  the 
land  I  will  carry  the  torch  before  him."  After  cap- 
turing the  Palatinate,  the  work  of  destroying  it 
began  in  January,  1689.  Twelve  hundred  villages 
and  towns  went  up  in  smoke  and  forty  thousand 
people  were  made  homeless  in  the  dead  of  winter. 
Heidelberg  was  destroyed  by  the  French  General 
Melac,  who  set  fire  to  the  town,  and  blew  up  the 
castle  March  2,  1689.  But  in  blowing  it  up,  he 
made  it  the  most  picturesque  ruin  in  Europe.    The 


*For    these    persecutions    in    the    Palatinate    see    my 
"History  of  the  Reformed  Church  of  Germany." 


192     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

a  stone-heap,  so  that  it  was  difficult  afterward  to 
locate  the  position  of  the  streets. 

Then  five  years  later,  as  if  all  this  destruction 
were  not  enough,  the  French  army  returned  in 
city  of  Manheim,  near  Heidelberg,  he  reduced  to 
1693  to  complete  the  destruction.  Heidelberg  was 
again  captured  by  them.  This  time  they  drove  the 
Reformed  people  into  the  great  church  of  the  city, 
the  Church  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  They  then  set  it 
on  fire  and  it  looked  as  if  all  within  would  be 
burned  up  in  the  church  in  an  awful  holocaust. 
"There  was  such  a  wailing  and  crying,"  says  an 
eye-witness,  "as  would  make  a  stone  weep."  Fi- 
nally when  the  steeple  of  the  church  was  in  flames 
and  the  bell  threatened  to  fall,  the  French  opened 
the  doors  and  drove  the  people  into  the  garden  of 
the  neighboring  Capuchin  cloister,  where  many 
were  killed  and  many  suffered  sufferings  worse 
than  death.  Some  had  already  died  of  fright  in 
the  church.  The  only  building  that  passed  safely 
through  that  period  unscathed  by  fire  is  the  beau- 
tiful Knights  Hall,*  opposite  the  Church  of  the 
Holy  Ghost,   which   had   been   built   in    1692  by  a 


*Ncw  the    Riter   Hotel. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         193 

Huguenot.  The  Church  of  the  Holy  Ghost  was 
now  in  ruins,  without  a  roof,  and  yet  in  the  ruins 
the  Reformed  people  held  their  worship.  And  at 
Manheim  the  Reformed  pastor  preached  in  the 
midst  of  the  ruins  and  divided  his  last  crust  of 
bread  with  his  suffering-  people.* 

But  when  the  French  had  departed  and  the  per- 
secutions of  war  were  over,  then  came  the  perse- 
cutions of  peace.  And  these  were  even  harder  to 
bear  than  those  of  war.  The  Elector  being  a  Cath- 
olic, the  Catholics  tried  in  every  way  to  gain  power. 
Every  effort  was  made  to  weaken  the  Reformed 
and  to  strengthen  the  Catholics.  It  was  the  old 
fable  of  the  camel  who  asked  the  owner  of  the  tent, 
first  to  be  permitted  to  put  his  nose  into  the  tent, 
then  his  body  and  then  himself,  so  that  finally  there 
was  no  room  at  all  for  the  owner  and  his  family  in 
the  tent.  So  the  Catholics  first  asked  for  the  use 
of  the  Reformed  church-bells  to  be  rung  for  Cath- 
olic services,  then  for  the  use  of  Reformed  grave- 
yards. Soon  the  Elector  John  William,  declared 
that  all  the  Reformed  Churches  were  open  to  the 


*A  very  interesting  novel  in  German  on  the  period 
of  these  French  wars  (1688-93)  is  entitled  "The  Rose 
of  Heidelberg,"  by  Robiano. 


194    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Catholics  to  hold  their  worship  in  them.  He  called 
this  the  Simultaneum,  holding  that  this  was  giving 
an  equality  of  rights  to  both  Catholics  and  Prot- 
estants in  the  church-buildings.  But  the  unequality 
is  shown  by  the  fact  that  he  never  opened  any  of 
the  Catholic  Churches  for  Reformed  worship. 
Children  of  mixed  marriages  were  forced  to  become 
Catholics.  When  the  pyx  was  carried  through  the 
streets,  the  Protestants  were  required  to  kneel  as 
it  passed.  Many  escaped  this  by  going  down  a 
neighboring  street,  when  they  saw  it  coming.  Prot- 
estants were  forbidden  to  work  on  Catholic  festival- 
days.  Matters  came  to  such  a  pass  that  finally  the 
Protestants,  in  1703,  made  an  appeal  to  the  Prot- 
estant states  of  Germany.  These  took  up  their 
case  and  threatened  reprisals  on  the  Catholics  in 
their  dominions.  The  King  of  Prussia  threatened 
to  take  away  the  Catholic  Churches  at  Halberstadt 
and  Magdeburg  from  the  Catholics.  This  forced 
the  Elector  of  the  Palatinate  to  terms  and  in  1705 
he  stopped  the  persecutions.  But  the  Church  of 
the  Holy  Ghost  at  Heidelberg,  now  rebuilt,  was  di- 
vided into  two  parts  by  a  division  wall,  the  Catho- 
lics taking  the  choir  for  their  worship  and  the  Prot- 
estants taking  the  nave. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         195 

But  this  better  state  of  affairs  continued  only 
for  a  short  time.  A  new  Elector,  Charles  Philip, 
came  to  the  throne  in  17 16.  He  was  more  bigoted 
than  the  former  Elector,  having  been  educated  by 
the  Jesuits.  By  17 19  the  persecutions  became  un- 
bearable again.  Soon  after  his  accession,  he  for- 
bade the  use  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism,  because 
its  eightieth  answer  called  the  mass  "an  accursed 
idolatry."  He  was  especially  angered  at  this  be- 
cause its  title-page  bore  the  coat  of  arms  of  the 
Palatinate,  having  been  put  there  by  Elector  Fred- 
erick III  when  the  catechism  was  first  printed. 
Then  he  went  farther  and  took  the  Church  of  the 
Holy  Ghost  at  Heidelberg  from  the  Reformed, 
breaking  down  the  partition  wall  in  it  and  taking 
not  only  the  choir  as  before,  but  the  whole  church, 
for  Catholic  worship.  This  occurred  September  4, 
1 719.  The  Reformed  now  had  no  place  of  worship 
as  their  churches  were  all  taken  from  them.  So 
they  had  to  worship  in  the  open  air  at  Monchhof, 
then  an  open  square  east  of  the  Church  of  the  Holy 
Ghost.  Finally  the  Reformed,  driven  to  despera- 
tion, again  appealed  to  the  Protestant  states  of 
Germany  for  aid.  These  took  up  their  case  and 
finally  ordered  reprisals.    The  King  of  Prussia  or- 


196    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

clered  the  Catholic  Church  at  Minden  to  be  closed, 
the  Landgrave  of  Hesse-Cassel  ordered  the  Catho- 
lic Church  at  St.  Goar  to  be  closed  and  King 
George  of  Hanover  (and  of  England)  closed  the 
Catholic  Church  at  Celle.  These  were  to  remain 
closed  as  long  as  the  Holy  Ghost  Church  at  Heidel- 
berg was  closed  to  the  Reformed. 

This  brought  the  Elector  and  the  Catholics  to 
terms.  But  the  Elector  uttered  the  threat  that 
if  he  were  compelled  to  give  back  the  Church  of  the 
Holy  Ghost  to  the  Reformed,  he  would  leave  Hei- 
delberg and  make  his  capital  at  Manheim.  He 
prophesied  that  Heidelberg  would  degenerate  into 
a  mere  village.  So  the  Church  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
was  given  back  to  the  Reformed,  the  partition  wall 
in  it  was  rebuilt,  the  Catholics  taking  the  choir  and 
the  Reformed  the  nave  as  before.*  The  Heidelberg 
Catechism  was  again  allowed  to  be  used  by  the 
Elector,  but  without  the  Electoral  coat-of-arms  on 
the  title-page.  And  the  Elector  removed  his  capital 
to  Manheim,  but  Heidelberg  did  not  degenerate  into 


*Since  the  organization  of  the  Old  Catholic  Church 
in  1871,  the  choir  has  been  given  to  them.  But  they 
have  become  almost  Evangelical  in  doctrine,  although 
their  worship  is  modeled  after  the  Catholics. 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         197 

a  village.  When  the  next  Elector,  Charles  Theo- 
dore, came  to  the  throne  the  Catholics  pursued  an- 
other tact.  As  they  had  found  they  could  not  de- 
stroy the  Reformed  by  persecutions  from  without 
their  church,  so  now  they  attempted  to  destroy  the 
church  by  corruption  within, — by  corrupting"  the 
consistory  if  possible  and  by  introducing-  the  prac- 
tice of  simony,  by  which  places  in  the  Church  were 
bought  and  sold.  Against  this  the  Reformed 
classes  protested.  For  this  the  Elector  then  for- 
bade the  classes  to  meet.  The  Church  appealed 
again  to  the  Protestant  states  of  Germany.  But  by 
that  time  the  Protestant  states  had  grown  tired  of 
controversy  and  so  the  Reformed  got  no  help. 

Finally  that  Catholic  line  of  princes  died  out  in 
1799  and  another  line  came  to  the  throne.  The 
new  Elector,  Max  Joseph,  was  a  Catholic,  but  was 
a  liberal  Catholic,  like  Emperor  Joseph  of  Austria. 
<  »n  June  25,  1799,  he  issued  an  edict  of  toleration 
giving  the  Reformed  equal  rights.  This  prince  re- 
founded  (1803)  the  University  of  Heidelberg,  mak- 
ing it  a  union  university,  at  which  both  Lutherans 
and  Reformed  occupied  chairs.  It  was  not,  how- 
ever, till  1 81 2  that  the  land  again  fell  to  a  Prot- 
estant prince,  when  it  was  given  to  the  Duke  of 


198    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Baden.  Thus  the  Reformed  suffered  for  a  century 
and  more  the  greatest  oppressions.  The  wonder 
was  that,  after  all  they  had  suffered,  there  was  any 
church  left  there.  Nevertheless  in  1783,  there  were 
240  Reformed  parishes  in  the  Palatinate  and  140,- 
000  members  over  against  90,000  Catholics  and  50,- 
000  Lutherans. 

A  new  era  now  began  to  dawn  on  the  Reformed 
Church.  The  university  having  been  made  union 
Baden  was  prepared  to  follow  the  move  of  Prussia 
in  1817  in  uniting  the  Lutheran  and  Reformed 
Churches,  so  that  now  there  is  only  one  state  church 
in  the  Palatinate,  the  Evangelical  or  United  Church, 
made  up  of  Lutherans  and  Reformed.  But  as  the 
majority  of  them  are  Reformed,  they  have  af- 
fected the  consciousness  of  that  Church  more  than 
the  Lutheran.  Hence  the  form  of  worship  is  sim- 
pler than  in  the  Lutheran  parts  of  Germany.  There 
is  rarely  a  crucifix  found  on  the  communion  table. 
Instead  of  using  wafers  as  the  Lutherans  do  at  the 
Lord's  Supper,  bread  is  used  after  the  custom  of 
the  Reformed.  And  although  many  of  the  Luth- 
erans still  bow  when  they  receive  the  elements  at 
the  Lord's  Supper,  the  Reformed  do  not.  The 
Presbyterial  form  of  government  has  been  intro- 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         199 

duced,  so  that  even  the  Lutheran  Churches  are  now 
Presbyterial.  Over  the  classes  and  synods  is  a 
consistory  appointed  by  the  state.  This  Palatinate 
Church  underwent  a  severe  controversy  with  ra- 
tionalism about  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury, about  a  new  hymn-book.  Dr.  Ebrard,  the  lead- 
er of  the  Evangelicals,  was  compelled  to  resign. 
Since  then  the  Church  has  been  mainly  under  the 
control  of  the  rationalists,  although  there  is  a 
strong  Evangelical  minority. 

The  university  reflected  the  changes  in  the 
Church.  It  had  some  very  strong  professors, — 
Charles  Daub  was  made  professor  (1795-1836),  a 
brilliant  mind,  the  Talleyrand  of  philosophy,  be- 
cause he  changed  so  often, — first  a  Kantian,  then 
a  follower  of  Schelling,  and  finally  an  adherent  of 
Hegel.  Daub  was  the  honored  teacher  of  Presi- 
dent F.  A.  Rauch  of  Marshall  College,  Mercers- 
burg,  Pa.  Later  came  Prof.  Paulus,  the  great 
rationalist,  and  also  Prof.  Schenkel,  originally 
Evangelical  in  Switzerland,  but  at  Heidelberg  he 
became  a  very  partisan  rationalist.  Charles  Ull- 
man  was  professor  from  1821  to  53.  He  was  more 
orthodox  than  Daub.  Yet  he  did  not  represent  the 
old  Calvinism  of  this  university,  which  gradually 


200    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

died  out  during  the  eighteenth  century  as  ration- 
alism came  in.  The  university  for  two  centuries 
was  Calvinistic  as  were  Ursinus  Pareus  and  Junius 
in  reformation  times.  But  Ullman  represented  the 
new  theology  of  Germany,  called  the  Mediating 
Theology,  founded  by  Schliermacher,  which  aimed 
to  mediate  between  orthodoxy  and  pantheism. 
True  he  represented  the  orthodox  tendency  of  that 
mediating  school,  but  he  was  not  fully  Reformed, 
but  occupied  a  general  evangelical  position.  He 
founded  a  great  German  theological  Review  called 
the  "Studien  and  Kritiken."  He  was  made  head 
of  the  Church  of  Baden  and  later  died  (1865)  with 
the  words  of  the  famous  German  hymn  on  his 
lips,  "O  Sacred  head,  now  wounded."  He  was  a 
defender  of  mild  orthodoxy.  But  since  his  day  the 
university  has  swung  over  strongly  to  rationalism, 
so  that  now,  out  of  the  nine  professors  of  theology 
only  one  is  evangelical.  And  he  is  not  Reformed 
but  a  mild  Lutheran  or  evangelical  by  birth,  Prof. 
Lewis  Lemme.  But  he  is  a  valiant  defender  of  or- 
thodoxy, having  been  especially  noted  in  his  con- 
troversy with  the  new  school  of  rationalistic  Ger- 
man theology,  the  Ritschlian  School. 

The  history  of  the  re-establishment  of  evangel- 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         201 

ical  worship  in  Heidelberg  is  a  sad  but  interesting 
illustration  of  the  condition  of  religion  in  many 
cities  in  Germany,  due  especially  to  the  seculariz- 
ing of  religion  by  its  union  with  the  state.  The 
rationalists,  having  gained  control  of  the  univer- 
sity, soon  gained  control  of  the  city  and  would  not 
permit  a  Positive  or  Evangelical  minister  to  be 
elected.  Twice  the  Evangelicals  tried  to  elect  an 
Evangelical  pastor,  but  were  defeated  especially 
through  the  influence  of  the  rationalistic  Prof. 
Schenkel.  The  few  Evangelicals  longed  for  the 
old  Gospel  and  starved  on  the  miserable  husks  of 
rationalism.  In  1867.  a  princess  of  Oldenburg  hap- 
pened to  live  at  Heidelberg  for  the  education  of 
her  sons.  Not  satisfied  with  the  rationalistic 
preaching  in  the  churches,  she  had  private  worship, 
to  which  the  Evangelicals  came,  so  that  gradually 
a  small  congregation  gathered.  But  she  left  the 
next  year,  and  then  they  asked  the  city  authorities 
that  a  weekly  Bible-lecture  be  granted  them  in  the 
St.  Peter's  church  on  Wednesday  afternoons.  They 
were  refused.  This  led  them  to  form  their  own 
Evangelical  Society  and  in  1869  to  begin  religious 
services  of  their  own.  Although  their  room  was 
small   and  the   seats   uncomfortable  yet  prominent 


202    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

visitors  who  avoided  rationalistic  worship  would 
attend,  as  the  Queen  of  Sweden,  the  Prince  of 
Mecklenberg  and  Field  Marshall  Manteuffel.  In 
1 87 1  they  again  tried  to  have  an  Evangelical  pastor 
elected  but  were  defeated.  So  in  1876,  they  built 
their  own  chapel  on  the  Ploack  street  and  started 
a  Sunday  school.  They  were  ignored  at  first  by  the 
rationalistic  pastors  and  ridiculed  by  outspoken  ra- 
tionalists, but  they  kept  on  doing  a  good  work 
having  now  their  own  pastor.  Quite  a  large  con- 
gregation has  formed  itself  at  this  city  mission. 
Meanwhile,  the  rationalists,  finding  that  they  could 
not  keep  Evangelical  religion  out  of  Heidelberg, 
finally  allowed  the  election  of  an  assistant  pastor, 
who  was  an  Evangelical.  And  now  one  of  the  pas- 
tors is  Evangelical,  Rev.  Mr.  Goetz,  at  the  Holy 
Ghost  church.  Where  twenty  years  ago  in  the 
Holy  Ghost  church  at  a  service,  the  only  Evangel- 
ical part  was  the  hymn  as  we  heard  them  sing, 
"Jesus  receiveth  sinners"  ("Jesus  nimmt  die  Sun- 
der an"),  last  winter  we  heard  in  the  same  church 
a  very  strong  outspoken  eloquent  sermon  by  Rev. 
Mr.  Goetz,  on  "I  am  not  ashamed  of  the  Gospel  of 
Christ."  It  seems  strange  that  Evangelical  Chris- 
tianity must  fight  for  its  very  existence  in  Chris- 


Heidelberg  and  Its  Ruined  Castle.         203 

tian  lands,  but  this  case  at  Heidelberg  could  be  du- 
plicated in  many  places  abroad.  Rationalism  is 
often  illiberal,  very  illiberal.  And  its  inconsistency 
is  all  the  more  glaring,  because  it  so  loudly  pro- 
fesses such  liberality.* 


*To  the  tourist  who  visits  Heidelberg,  the  interesting 
places  in  its  church  history  are  the  castle,  the  uni- 
versity, the  Holy  Ghost  church  and  St.  Peter's  church, 
in  whose  choir,  are  some  interesting  tombs,  among  them 
that  of  Olympia  Morata  the  great  female  Greek  schol- 
ar of  the  reformation.  On  the  Haupt-strasse  is  the 
Museum,  which  used  to  be  in  the  castle,  containing 
many  fine  pictures  of  the  different  Electors  and  also 
of  prominent  professors  in  the  university;  also  a  fine 
collection  of  Frankenthal  porcelain,  etc.  It  contains 
a  third  edition  of  the  Heidelberg  Catechism,  published 
1563. 


1      ^*gtf^jO  5n2I 

^MBEJsvL.**'  ..T-«i-^j"^^^^K^>H^I 

-      iiww 

(^^r^'—^IP       *^ 

.^tM^MHMtfi 

5^                            ^f~ .Jl 

Chapter     IV.— THE     BEAUTIFUL     RHINE- 
LAND   AND   THE   COLOGNE 
CATHEDRAL. 

THE  Rhine,  the  beautiful  Rhine,  is  the  most 
picturesque  river  in  Europe,  its  sides  being 
castled  crags,  covered  with  rich  vineyards. 
These,  with  their  legends,  make  the  Rhine  very 
wierd  and  romantic.  The  Rhine  is  not  so  large  and 
grand  as  our  Hudson,  yet  it  is  doubly  interesting 
when  to  the  natural  scenery  is  added  the  religious 
history.  The  Rhine  region  in  many  parts  was  Re- 
formed land.  For  the  Reformed  doctrines  spread 
northward  from  Heidelberg. 

Indeed  before  the  Reformed  doctrines  had  en- 
tered Heidelberg,  two  places  had  already  heard 
them.  One  was  Marburg,  which  lies  east  of  the 
Rhine  district,  about  70  miles  northeast  of  Frank- 
ford  on  the  Main.  Marburg  is  beautifully  located 
in  the  narrow  valley  of  the  Lahn,  the  town  rising 
like  steps  around  the  hill,  until  it  culminates  in  the 
picturesque  castle  on  the  hill-top.  In  this  castle 
occurred  the  conference  to  which  we  referred  in 
the  life  of  Zwingli,  when  Luther  and  Zwingli  were 
brought  together.  The  ruler  of  that  district  of 
Germany  in  the  reformation  was  Landgrave 
205 


2o6     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Philip  of  Hesse,  a  brave  statesmen  and  aggressive 
prince.  He  determined  to  unite  the  Reformed  and 
Lutheran  Churches  if  possible,  so  that  they  might 
present  a  united  front  to  Catholicism.  So  he  in- 
vited Luther  and  Melancthon  to  come  from  Wit- 
tenberg; and  the  Reformed  leaders,  Zwingli  from 
Zurich,  Ecolampadius  from  Basle  and  Bucer  and 
Capito  from  Strassburg.  Luther  came  unwillingly 
and  when  climbing  the  hill  to  the  castle,  tradition 
says,  he  kept  repeating  the  words  about  the  Lord's 
Supper,  "This  is  my  body."  They  met  on  Octo- 
ber i,  1529.  The  first  day  was  spent  in  private 
conference,  the  Landgrave  putting  the  aggressive 
Luther  with  the  mild  Ecolampadius  and  the  ardent 
Zwingli  with  the  more  mediating  Melancthon. 
These  conferences  prepared  the  way  for  the  pub- 
lic conference  held  the  next  day,  when  all  the  re- 
formers gathered  before  the  two  princes,  the  Land- 
grave of  Hesse  and  the  Duke  of  Wurtemberg,  and 
discussed  the  Lord's  Supper.  Luther  wrote  in 
chalk  on  the  table  before  him  the  words,  "This  is 
my  body,"  so  as  to  prevent  himself  from  making 
any  concessions.  Zwingli  held  that  the  meaning  of 
those  words  was  to  be  taken  figuratively.  Luther 
held  that  it  was  literal,  not  figurative. 

On    the    next    day,    unfortunately,    the    English 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  2<yj 

plague  broke  out  in  the  crowded  town,  which  broke 
up  the  conference.  But  before  the .  reformers  sep- 
arated, the  landgrave  tried  to  get  them  to  unite. 
Zwingli  held  out  his  hand  for  union.  But  Luther 
refused,  saying  "You  have  another  spirit."  Finally 
fifteen  articles  of  faith  were  drawn  up,  called  the 
"Marburg  Articles,"  to  which,  they  all  agreed,  ex- 
cept to  the  article  about  the  Lord's  Supper,  where 
the  Lutherans  and  the  Reformed  differed.  So  the 
two  Churches  were  not  united  and  the  reformers 
went  to  their  respective  homes.  But  the  effect  of 
the  conference  was  to  open  the  eyes  of  Germany 
to  what  Zwinglianism  or  the  Reformed  doctrines 
really  were.  The  Lutherans  had  thought  that  the 
Reformed  were  Arians  and  held  to  heretical  doc- 
trines. They  were  surprised  to  find,  that,  except 
on  the  Lord's  Supper,  the  Reformed  agreed  with 
them.  It  can  not  be  said,  who  was  victorious  in  the 
debate  at  Marburg,  Luther  or  Zwingli.  But  Lam- 
bert of  Avignon,  the  reformer  of  Hesse,  declared 
he  went  into  the  conference  with  his  mind  like  a 
sheet  of  white  paper,  waiting  for  impressions.  He 
afterwards  accepted  the  Reformed  doctrines,  which 
shows  the  effect  of  the  conference,  although  he  un- 
fortunately died  very  soon  after  the  conference. 
In  the  castle  is  still  shown  the  beautiful  Gothic 


2o8    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

room,  in  which  tradition  says  the  conference  took 
place,  although  it  is  probable  that  it  took  place  in 
another  part  of  the  castle,  in  the  east  wing.  But 
there  is  no  room  in  the  castle  so  suitable  for  it  as 
the  Gothic  room.  The  room  next  to  it  contains  a 
fine  museum  of  Hessian  documents,  among  them 
is  the  original  Marburg  article,  and  also  the  orig- 
inal of  the  Protest  of  Spire,  1529,  signed  by  the 
German  nobles,  who  were  Protestants. 

Just  south  of  the  castle  on  the  hill-side  is  the 
Lutheran  church,  which  was  the  scene  of  a  riot 
against  the  Reformed  in  1605.  The  year  before 
(1604)  the  Landgrave  of  Hesse-Cassel,  Maurice, 
the  grandson  of  Landgrave  Philip,  introduced  the 
Reformed  faith  into  Hesse-Cassel,  which  had  been 
low-Lutheran.  The  people  of  Marburg,  who  were 
high-Lutheran  strongly  resented  this.  And  when 
the  Reformed  ministers  attempted  to  preach  in  the 
Lutheran  church,  they  threw  one  of  the  ministers 
out  of  the  church.  Another  fled  to  the  parsonage 
for  a  refuge,  but  the  former  minister's  wife,  an- 
gered at  the  introduction  of  the  Reformed  faith, 
refused  to  let  him  in  and  he  fled  through  the  streets, 
now  pursued  by  a  woman  with  a  washing  bottle, 
now  by  a  laborer  with  a  flail.  Marburg  has  re- 
mained Lutheran  to  this  day,  but  a  Reformed  con- 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  209 

gregation  was  established  and  is  to-day  the  church 
of  the  university. 

The  finest  church  building  in  Marburg  is  the 
Lutheran  church  of  St.  Elizabeth,  named  after  the 
holy  Elizabeth,  one  of  the  saints  of  the  Catholic 
Church.  She  was  the  daughter  of  the  King  of 
Hungary  and  lived  in  the  thirteenth  century.  She 
gave  herself  up  entirely  to  works  of  charity.  After 
she  was  buried  in  this  church,  she  was  canonized 
by  the  pope  a  few  years  after  her  death.  Even 
to-day  the  Catholics  are  very  bitter  because  they 
lost  her  church  and  are  ever  scheming  to  get  it 
back,  which  is  not  likely.  Marburg  is  to-day  a 
quiet  university  town,  the  university  having  about 
2,000  students,  a  large  number  for  so  small  a  place. 
The  university  was  Reformed  from  1604- 1822,  ex- 
cept during  part  of  the  Thirty  Years  war,  when  it 
reverted  back  to  the  Lutherans.  Since  1822  it  has 
been  union,  that  is,  having  both  Reformed  and 
Lutheran  professors  of  theology.* 

The    other   place,    that    received    the    Reformed 


*A  fine  painting  connected  with  the  Marburg  con- 
ference is  on  the  wall  of  the  aula  of  the  university, 
representing  the  Landgrave  receiving  the  reformers  at 
the  gate  of  his  castle.  A  painting  of  the  conference 
itself  is  found  in  the  picture-gallery  at  the  ducal  palace 
at  Darmstadt. 


2io     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

doctrines  before  Heidelberg  was  Frankford,  about 
fifty  miles  north  of  Heidelberg,  located  on  a  tribu- 
tary of  the  Rhine,  the  Main.  It  is  a  very  large  city 
of  350,000  inhabitants,  of  whom  13,000  are  Jews, 
among  them  the  wealthy  Rothchilds.  Frankford 
became  Lutheran  in  the  reformation.  But  in  1554, 
when  the  refugees  fled  from  England  and  Holland, 
they  came  to  Frankford  and  at  first  worshipped  in 
the  Church  of  our  Lady,  but  afterwards  in  the 
All  Saints  church.  John  Knox  was  pastor  of  the 
English  church  (November,  1554,  to  March,  1555). 
In  this  English  congregation  occurred  the  first 
quarrel  between  the  ritualists  and  low  churchmen 
of  the  Episcopal  or  Anglican  Church, — the  proph- 
ecy of  many  later  church  controversies  in  England 
between  Prelatists  and  Puritans.  Here  John  Knox 
published  his  famous  blast  against  the  divine  right 
of  women  to  rule  nations  which  was  directed 
against  Bloody  Queen  Mary,  but  greatly  angered 
Queen  Elizabeth.*     When  the  Lutherans  began  to 


*A  copy  of  this  "Godly  Admonition"  is  in  the  splen- 
did City  Library  of  Frankford,  of  which  Dr.  Ebrard, 
son  of  the  theologian,  the  late  J.  H.  A.  Ebrard,  is 
librarian.  He  is  an  elder  in  the  French  Reformed 
church  at  Frankford. 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Laud.  211 

oppress  the  Reformed  in  Frankford,  Calvin  visited 
Frankford  September,  1556.  In  1562  the  Reform- 
ed were  entirely  driven  out  of  the  city  by  the  Luth- 
eran authorities.  They  then  attended  worship  at 
Bockenheim  northwest  of  Frankford,  and  Offen- 
bach or  Sachsenhausen,  on  the  other  side  of  the 
Main,  which  were  in  the  territory  of  Reformed 
princes.  Many  of  them  removed  to  the  city  of 
Hanau,  east  of  Frankford,  which  became  a  great 
Reformed  stronghold.  Reformed  worship  was  not 
permitted  in  Frankford  until  1702  and  then  on 
condition  that  the  Reformed  church,  if  erected, 
would  not  look  like  a  church,  but  like  an  ordinary 
dwelling.  As  a  result,  the  two  Reformed  churches 
there  now,  the  German  and  the  French,  have  no 
steeples  or  anything  to  show  that  they  are  church 
buildings — they  look  like  ordinary  houses. 

East  of  the  Rhine  and  north  of  Frankford  is  a 
large  district  called  Nassau  or  the  Wetterau  dis- 
trict, named  after  the  river  Wetter.  It  was  divided 
into  several  counties,  some  of  which  were  Re- 
formed. The  most  notable  of  them  was  Nassau- 
Dillenburg,  whose  prince  had  his  capital  at  Dillen- 
burg.  His  land  was  originally  Lutheran  but  the 
Reformed  doctrines  were  introduced  by  Pezel,  the 


212    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Melancthonian,  when  he  fled  from  Wittenberg 
(I577)-  And  later  Olevianus,  one  of  the  authors 
of  the  Heidelberg  catechism,  when  he  fled  from 
Heidelberg,  after  briefly  staying  at  Berleberg  with 
the  Count  of  Sayn-Wittgenstein,  found  a  perma- 
nent home  at  Herborn  in  Nassau-Dillenburg. 
There  Count  John  of  Nassau-Dillenburg  founded 
for  him  a  Reformed  university,  to  which  he  donated 
his  castle.*  Those  Nassau  princes  were  great 
founders  of  educational  institutions,  Count  John's 
two  brothers,  William  of  Orange,  and  Lewis  of 
Nassau,  each  founded  a  university  in  Holland — 
the  first,  at  Leyden,  the  second,  at  Franeker.  Ole- 
vianus taught  at  Herborn  until  his  death  (1587). 
Just  before  he  died  his  colleague,  Prof.  Alsted, 
asked  him  if  he  was  certain  of  his  salvation.  He 
replied  in  one  Latin  word  "Certissimus,"  meaning 
"I  am  most  certain."  Thus  the  first  answer  of  his 
Heidelberg  Catechism,  which  so  beautifully  speaks 
of  the  comfort  in  life  and  death  was  his  consola- 
tion in  the  moment  of  death.  His  successor  as  head 
of  the  university  was  Piscator,  a  very  learned  man, 


*The  building  is  still  in  use  as  the  Theological  Sem- 
inary of  the  Nassau  church,  under  the  presidency  of 
Prof.  E.  Knodt,  who  is  Reformed. 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  213 

who  published  a  German  translation  of  the  Bible, 
which  is  truer  to  the  original  than  the  Lutheran 
version,  and  so  high  was  its  merit  that  the  Luth- 
erans were  at  first  afraid  it  might  supplant  the 
Lutheran  version.  This  it  never  did,  although  it 
was  introduced  later  into  the  canton  of  Bern  in 
Switzerland.    ■ 

This  university  of  Herborn  exerted  a  wide  in- 
fluence for  the  Reformed.  Later  it  became  Cocce- 
ian  in  its  Calvinistic  theology  and  pietistic  in  its 
spirit.  From  it  came  in  1752,  five  young  men  to 
aid  in  founding  the  German  Reformed  Church  in 
the  United  States,  the  most  prominent  of  whom  was 
Otterbein.  In  the  little  parish  church  at  Herborn 
are  the  tombs  of  Olevianus  and  Piscator.  The  Ger- 
man Reformed  Church  in  the  United  States  has 
erected  a  slab  to  the  former  in  the  church. 

Passing  still  further  northward  along  the  Rhine, 
we  come  to  Cologne,  the  city  with  the  matchless 
cathedral, — a  poem  in  stone,  magnificently  great  in 
its  simplicity,  symmetry,  delicacy  and  beauty.  It 
has  only  recently  been  completed  by  the  Emperor 
of  Germany.  Its  two  spires  are  among  the  highest 
in  Europe,  512  feet  high,  and  the  nave  of  the  church 
is  148  feet  high.    The  effect  of  the  exterior  is  won- 


214    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

derfully  beautiful  and  harmonious,  the  effect  of  its 
interior  is  deeply  impressive.  It  is  an  interesting 
fact  to  notice  that  on  two  occasions  in  its  history, 
this  great  cathedral,  so  sacred  to  the  Catholic  faith, 
had  Reformed  doctrines  preached  in  it.  Indeed 
the  whole  history  of  the  Reformed  Church  in 
Cologne  is  exceedingly  interesting. 

For  although  Cologne  has  always  been  a  great 
centre  of  Catholicism,  yet  the  Reformed  doctrines 
began  entering  there.  And  suddenly  no  less  a  per- 
sonage than  the  ruler  of  the  place,  the  Elector  of 
Cologne,  Elector  Herman,  about  1540,  became  Re- 
formed and  tried  to  introduce  the  Reformed  doc- 
trines into  that  region,  even  calling  in  Bucer  and 
Melancthon  to  draw  up  a  form  of  worship  for  him. 
He  was  driven  out,  and  a  Catholic  was  elected  in  his 
stead.  But  not  all  the  Reformed  went  away  with 
him,  for  a  secret  Reformed  congregation  gathered, 
which  was  called,  as  were  all  the  secret  and  op- 
pressed Reformed  churches  of  that  day,  the  "Church 
under  the  Cross." 

In  1582,  a  similar  event  occurred  in  Cologne  as 
another  of  the  Electors  of  Cologne  went  over  to  the 
Reformed  faith,  Gebhard  Truchsess.  Indeed,  at 
this  time,  a  large  part  of  the  city  seems  to  have 


The  Beautiful  RJiinc-Land.  215 

become  Protestant.  For  although  Reformed  wor- 
ship was  forbidden  in  the  city,  the  neighboring 
Count  of  Neuenar  held  Reformed  religious  services 
at  Mechtern,  just  outside  one  of  the  city  gates,  to 
which  the  people  streamed  by  .thousands.  This  so 
angered  the  authorities  that  they  threatened  to 
bombard  the  place  of  worship.  But  the  Protestant 
nobles  prevented  it.  Gebhard  Truchsess  was  de- 
posed and  a  Catholic  elected  in  his  place,  so  the 
cathedral  again  reverted  to  the  Catholics. 

Secret  worship,  however,  was  still  held  by  the 
Reformed.  Reformed  ministers,  disguised  as  mer- 
chants, would  slip  into  the  city  and  hold  worship 
at  some  house.*  When  this  secret  Reformed  wor- 
ship was  being  held,  an  elder  watched  outside  the 
door  and  a  deacon  inside  the  door.  Still,  although 
a  secret  church,  the  Reformed  congregation  was 
thoroughly  organized.  The  city  was  divided  into 
the  districts  and  each  district  was  assigned  to  an 
elder,  whose  duty  it  was  to  visit  the  sick  and  to 
give  notice  of  religious  services.  At  the  birth  of 
a  child,  it  was  quite  customary  for  the  Reformed 


*When  these  ministers  went  to  meetings  of  classis, 
they  had  their  reports  made  out  in  a  mercantile  form, 
for  fear  of  being  discovered  by  the  Catholics. 


216    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

family  to  go  to  one  of  the  neighboring  villages  for 
a  stay  of  a  few  weeks,  so  that  the  child  would  not 
be  baptized  in  Cologne  and  so  be  claimed  by  the 
Catholics.  This  "Church  under  the  Cross"  contin- 
ued its  worship,  until  in  1609  the  Catholics  drove 
them  out.  They  then  founded  a  city  on  the  east  side 
of  the  Rhine,  now  called  Muehlheim  on  the  Rhine. 
For  many  years  the  Reformed  were  not  permitted 
to  worship  in  Cologne,  but  had  to  go  either  to 
Muehlheim  on  the  other  side  of  the  Rhine  or  to 
some  neighboring  Reformed  village  west  of  the 
Rhine.  Later  the  inhabitants  of  Cologne  attacked 
Muehlheim  by  night  and  razed  its  buildings  to  the 
ground.  But  it  has  since  been  rebuilt.  However, 
by  the  nineteenth  century,  liberty  was  granted  and 
there  is  now  a  large  Protestant  congregation  in 
Cologne,  mainly  Reformed,  having  about  26,000 
adherents. 

Gradually  as  the  Reformed  doctrines  were  more 
and  more  fully  introduced  until  finally  a  synod  was 
organized  in  the  district  around  Cologne,  called, 
after  the  four  main  counties  in  it,  the  synod  of 
Juliers-Cleve-Berg  and  Mark.*     A  large  part  of 


*Juliers  and  Cleve  were  west  of  the  Rhine,  and  Berg 
and  Mark  east  of  it. 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  217 

its  congregations  up  to  1610,  belonged  to  the  Dutch 
synod  of  Holland,  but  in  161 1  the  synod  was  or- 
ganized. It  has  a  very  interesting  history  because 
it  was  the  only  synod  in  Germany  separate  from 
the  state  and  therefore  the  only  part  of  the  Re- 
formed Church  of  Germany  to  have  a  purely  pres- 
byterial  organization.  Certain  other  districts  in 
that  neighborhood  also  had  their  own  organization 
as  the  counties  of  Tecklenberg  and  Bentheim. 

But  there  is  no  place  in  Germany  to-day,  which 
is  so  great  a  centre  of  the  Reformed  Church,  as 
Elberfeld,  located  between  thirty  and  forty  miles 
north  of  Cologne  and  about  fifteen  miles  east  of 
Diisseldorf.  In  a  narrow  valley  not  a  mile  wide, 
whose  sides  rise  steeply  and  through  which  flows 
in  a  serpentine  course  the  Wupper  creek,  are  the 
twin  cities  of  Elberfeld  and  Barmen,  each  having 
a  population  of  about  100,000.  This  valley  is  a 
perfect  hive  of  industry  and  throbs  with  factories 
of  all  kinds.  This  is  due  to  the  Reformed  Church. 
For  the  ruler  of  this  land  was  a  Catholic  and  for- 
bade the  Protestants  to  take  places  in  political  life, 
so  they  went  into  business  with  such  success  that 
these  cities  have  become  some  of  the  great  indus- 
trial centres  of  Germany. 


218     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

In  fact  there  is  an  interesting  historical  fact  con- 
nected with  this  land.  When  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  the  Count  of  Juliers-Cleve-Mark  and  Berg 
died,  two  princes  aspired  to  be  his  successor,  the 
Elector  of  Brandenburg  and  the  Count  of  Pfalz- 
Neuburg.  They  had  agreed  to  compromise,  when 
the  former  in  a  fit  of  passion,  gave  the  latter  a  box 
on  the  ear.  The  latter  vowed  vengeance  for  this 
insult,  and,  to  gain  the  support  of  the  Catholics,  he 
went  over  to  the  Catholic  faith.  This  was  very 
unfortunate  for  the  Protestants  in  that  land,  for 
because  of  it,  they  had  to  suffer  many  persecutions. 
Thus  the  Reformed  church  at  Elberfeld  was  taken 
from  them  and  given  to  the  Catholics,  although  all 
the  population  except  six  families  were  Reformed. 
In  1629  that  Reformed  church  was  broken  into  by 
force,  the  communion  table  carried  away  and  its 
books  burned.  The  Reformed  church  at  Solingen 
also  suffered.  It  had  a  faithful  pastor  in  Lunen- 
schloss.  Many  were  his  and  their  persecutions. 
The  Reformed  church  was  taken  from  them  and 
during  the  cold  winter  they  had  to  worship  in  the 
open  air.  He  was  finally  arrested  and  taken  away 
to  Diisseldorf,  when  on  the  way  thither  his  accu- 
sers met  the  wife  of  his  prince,  who  was  herself 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Laud.  219 

a  member  of  the  Reformed  Church.  Through  her 
intercessions  he  was  freed  and  returned  to  his 
congregation.  There  is  a  story  told  of  one  of  these 
congregations  that  the  Duke  of  Pfalz-Neuberg  had 
ordered  them  to  give  up  their  church,  to  the  Cath- 
olics on  a  certain  Sunday,  and  his  soldiers  were 
waiting  outside  to  take  it  as  the  Reformed  held 
their  last  service  in  it.  Determined  to  prolong  their 
occupancy  as  long  as  possible,  the  Reformed  sang 
the  longest  Psalm,  the  119th  Psalm,  for  in  those 
days  in  that  region  they  were  Psalm-singers.  And 
before  they  had  finished  that  long  Psalm,  lo,  an 
order  arrived  from  their  prince  allowing  them  to 
keep  the  church.  Such  were  some  of  the  persecu- 
tions from  their  Catholic  prince.  But  in  spite  of 
it  the  Reformed  grew  in  numbers  and  influence. 

This  whole  region  in  the  northern  Rhine  became 
the  home  of  Pietism  in  the  Reformed  Church.  The 
prophecyings  begun  in  the  reformation  at  Zurich, 
Geneva  and  London  by  Zwingli,  Calvin  and  Lasco, 
developed  later  into  prayer-meetings.  This  Pietistic 
movement  was  introduced  into  the  Lutheran  Church 
by  Spener.  Spener  got  it  from  the  Reformed,  for 
he  attended  Labadie's  services  at  Geneva.  But 
five  years  before  Spener  began  his  prayer-meetings 


220    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

at  Frankford,  the  Reformed  had  them  in  Germany. 
Theredore  Untereyck,  a  Reformed  minister  at 
Miihlheim  on  the  Ruhr,  15  miles  northwest  of 
Elberfeld,  began  them  in  1665.  And  he  had  got- 
ten them  from  the  Reformed  Church  of  Holland 
which  had  been  pietistic  from  the  days  of  the  ref- 
ormation. Untereyck  went  to  Bremen  in  1670 
where  he  introduced  Pietism.  After  him  there 
came  into  this  northern  Rhine  region,  Joachim 
Neander,  rector  of  the  Reformed  school  at  Diissel- 
dorf  in  1674. 

In  the  eighteenth  century,  there  arose  the  great- 
est pietist  of  this  district,  Gerhard  Tersteegen.* 
He  was  born  at  Meurs  (1697).  He  wanted  to 
study  for  the  ministry  but  was  not  able  financially 
to  do  so.  As  a  layman,  he  probably  exerted  a 
wider  influence  than  he  would  have  done  as  a  min- 
ister. He  became  an  apprentice  at  Miihlheim  on 
the  Ruhr  and  there  came  under  such  deep  convic- 
tion of  sin  that  lasted  for  five  years.  When  he 
found  peace  at  last,  he  wrote  his  dedication  to  God 
in  his  own  blood.     He  became  a  silk-and  ribbon- 


*For  an  account  of  his  life  see  my  "History  of  the 
Reformed  Church  of  Germany,"  pages  447-470. 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  '  221 

weaver,  and  later  a  physician.  While  in  business 
he  had  already  begun  to  hold  religious  services  and 
finally  gave  up  everything  to  labor  only  in  spiritual 
things.  His  home  at  Miihlheim  is  not  very  far  from 
Essen  where  the  Krupp  factories  turn  out  the  guns 
that  shake  the  world.  But  a  greater  and  better  in- 
fluence than  theirs  went  forth  from  Tersteegen's 
house  to  shake  the  world,  for  he  influenced  not 
merely  all  western  Germany,  but  his  books  were 
sold  in  America.  People  would  come  long  dis- 
tances to  converse  with  him  on  religious  subjects. 
Sometimes  as  many  as  twenty  or  thirty  would  be 
waiting  in  the  outer  room  in  order  to  speak  with 
him  about  their  souls'  interests.  Sick  people  would 
send  for  him  and  he  would  go  and  spend  hours, 
yes,  whole  nights,  with  them  in  prayer.  At  his 
services,  his  house  would  become  so  crowded  in 
the  stairs  and  entries,  that  ladders  would  be  put 
up  to  the  windows  outside  and  on  them,  people 
would  stand  to  hear  him  speak.  Sometimes  when 
he  was  travelling,  as  when  he  went  to  Holland,  he 
would  be  waylaid  by  the  roadside  and  carried  off 
to  some  barn,  where  the  people  would  insist  on 
hearing  him  preach.  His  religious  works  found 
quick  reading  and  ready  sale. 


222     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

He  is  the  author  of  a  number  of  hymns,  of  which 
two  have  become  popular  in  the  English.     One  is : 

"Lo.  God  is  here — let  us  adore, 

And  own  how  dreadful  is  this  place. 
Let   all  within   us   feel   his   power, 
And,  silent,  bow  before  his  face." 

This  hymn  gives  the  clue_  to  his  Christian  life. 
He  always  lived  as  in  God's  presence.  The  other 
hymn  is : 

"God  calling  yet!  shall  I   not  hear? 
Earth's  pleasure  shall  I  still  hold  dear? 
Shall  life's  swift  passing  years  all  fly 
And  still  my  soul  in  slumber  fly?" 

The  last  verse  of  this  hymn  was  his  dedication  to 
God: 

God  calling  yet,   I   cannot  stay, 

My  heart  I  yield  without  delay, 

Vain  world!  farewell,  from  thee  I  part, 

The  voice  of  God  hath  reached  my  heart. 

His  preaching  resulted  in  great  awakenings  in 
that  district.  Some  of  his  followers  founded 
"Brothers  Houses"  or  "Pilgrims  Cottages  at  Miihl- 
heim,  and  Otterbeck  near  by.     He  died  April  3, 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  223 

1769,  but  his  influence  has  ever  remained  through- 
out that  district.  In  Mtihlheim,  beside  the  Reform- 
ed church  is  a  statue  to  his  memory.  His  cottage, 
a  plain  wooden  building,  with  an  antiquated  roof, 
is  also  shown.  Next  door  to  it  lives  a  relative  of 
his,  who  has  some  relics  of  him  as  his  knife  and 
spoon. 

Although  the  town  of  Siegen  is  rather  far  south 
for  this  district  (for  it  really  belongs  to  the  Nassau 
district  of  which  we  spoke  before),  yet  it  became 
thoroughly  imbued  with  this  spirit  of  the  northern 
Rhine.  The  country  around  Siegen  is  Reformed- 
land.  One  of  its  rulers.  Count  John  Maurice  of 
Nassau-Siegen,  came  to  America  in  the  seventeenth 
century,  where  he  was  ruler  over  the  Dutch  col- 
ony at  Pernambuco,  Brazil.  He  was,  therefore, 
always  called  the  American — the  Brazilian. 

Siegen  greatly  felt  the  pietistic  movement  of 
Muhlheim.  A  later  follower  of  Tersteegen  lived 
there,  named  Christian  Stahlschmidt.  He  came 
to  America  just  before  the  American  revolution, 
and  became  a  Reformed  minister  in  Pennsylvania, 
but  owing  to  the  privations  of  the  war,  he  soon 
went  back  to  Germany  and  lived  at  Siegen  till  1824. 
He  took  Tersteegen's  place  and  by  his  meetings 


224    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

produced  great  revivals  all  through  that  district. 
His  earnest  spirit  was  continued  by  a  great  nephew, 
named  Siebel,  who  lived  at  Freudenberg  near  Sie- 
gen,  and  who  died  1875. 

These  revival  movements  gave  a  freshness  and 
strength  to  the  Reformed  church  of  the  northern 
Rhine.  Rationalism  was  largely  kept  out  by  them, 
and  Elberfeld  produced  a  number  of  prominent 
ministers  of  the  Reformed  faith.  Perhaps  no  fam- 
ily of  preachers  in  Germany  has  been  so  prominent 
as  the  Krummacher  family,  all  of  whom  were 
from  this  district  or  labored  here.  Frederick  Adolf 
Krummacher  was  professor  of  theology  at  the  Re- 
formed University  at  Duisburg  (now  incorporated 
in  the  University  of  Bonn)  about  the  beginning  of 
the  nineteenth  century.  His  brother,  Gottfried 
Daniel  Krummacher,  though  not  so  scholarly  was 
a  greater  orator.  He  was  called  by  the  people  "the 
bone  and  marrow  preacher,"  for  his  preaching,  like 
the  Word  of  God  pierced  even  to  the  bone  and  mar- 
row. He  was  pastor  at  Baerl  and  then  at  Elber- 
feld in  1816.  He  died  in  1837.  His  preaching  led 
to  great  awakenings  in  that  region. 

But  the  most  polished  flower  of  the  Krummacher 
family  was  the  son  of  Frederick  Adolph   Krum- 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  225 

macher,  Frederick  William  Krummacher.*  He 
was  probably  the  greatest  pulpit  orator  of  Ger- 
many in  his  time.  In  1825  he  became  pastor  at 
Barmen  where  he  preached  his  famous  sermons  on 
Elijah  and  Elisha,  which  have  been  translated  into 
English.  Thorwaldsen,  the  great  sculptor,  once 
asked  him  at  Frankford,  where  he  was  attracted 
to  him  by  his  noble  forehead  and  appearance,  "Are 
you  an  artist?"  "No,  a  theologian,"  was  the  reply. 
"How  can  one  by  only  a  theologian?"  responded 
Thorwaldsen.  But  though  Krummacher  was  only 
a  theologian,  yet  he  proved  how  a  theologian  could 
also  be  an  artist ;  for  his  sermons  were  classics, 
abounding  in  images  and  Gospel  fervor.  Later  he 
was  called  to  Potsdam,  near  Berlin,  as  the  court 
preacher  of  the  King  of  Prussia,  where  he  died 
1868. 

At  present  the  Reformed  church  at  Elberfeld 
has  between  30,000  and  40,000  adherents  and  the 
Reformed  church  at  Barmen  between  15,000  and 
20,000.  The  congregations  in  each  city  form  a 
collegiate  church.     Also  a  Netherlands  Reformed 


*For  his  life- see  his  Autobiography;  also  my  "His- 
tory of  the  Reformed  Church  of  Germany,  also  his 
Autobiography  which  has  been  translated  into  English- 


226    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

church  was  organized  there  about  1834,  when  Rev. 
Herman  F.  Kohlbritgge,  D.D.,  was  called  from 
Holland.  He  became  a  very  prominent  preacher 
and  theologian,  being  a  high  Calvinist.  He  died 
1875.  Owing  to  the  Pietism  at  Elberfeld,  no  ra- 
tionalism ever  was  allowed  in  its  pulpit.  The  con- 
gregations are  still  strongly  Reformed.  One  of 
its  members,  on  finding  that  the  writer  was  an 
American  Reformed  minister,  put  as  his  first  ques- 
tion to  him :  "Do  you  believe  in  the  election  of 
grace?"  Where  but  in  Scotland  would  such  a 
question  have  been  the  first  to  be  asked.  And  we 
doubt  whether  in  the  Scotch  church  of  to-day  it 
would  be  asked  at  all.  But  to  the  Reformed  of 
Elberfeld,  that  doctrine  of  election,  as  it  is  taught 
in  their  Heidelberg  catechism,  was  synonymous 
with  God's  grace  rather  than  with  God's  sovereign- 
ty; and  that  belief  in  grace, — "grace,  nothing  but 
grace,  all  grace,"  was  to  them  the  antidote  against 
all  rationalism.  Hence  this  good  Reformed  was  only 
trying  to  find  out  whether  the  writer  was  a  ra- 
tionalist by  asking  if  he  believed  in  the  election  of 
grace.  For  there  they  have  great  faith  in  God  and 
in  the  Bible.  The  members  of  the  Reformed 
church  there  frequently  hold  a  prayer-meeting  after 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  227 

the  service  to  discuss  and  pray  over  the  sermon. 
And  they  have  also  catechism  prayer-meetings 
where  they  take  a  question  of  the  Heidelberg  cate- 
chism, talk  over  it  and  pray  over  it.  And  it  used 
to  be  the  custom,  we  know  not  whether  it  still  is, 
for  the  minister  to  preach  on  the  catechism  on 
Sunday  afternoons, — this  was  the  old  method  of 
the  Dutch  and  German  churches. 

Pietism  produced  a  number  of  religious  insti- 
tions  in  this  district  which  need  to  be  noted  before 
we  leave  it.  Barmen  is  the  seat  of  the  Rhenish 
Foreign  Missionary  Society.  This  society  is  not 
denominational  but  it  is  largely  controlled  by  the 
Reformed  consciousness,  more  so  than  any  other 
of  the  Foreign  Missionary  Societies  of  Germany. 
It  was  founded  in  1828  through  the  efforts  of  the 
Pietist  Siebel.  It  has  its  missions  in  South  Africa, 
Borneo,  New  Guinea  and  Sumatra.  Laterly  this 
mission  has  been  very  successful  among  the  Mo- 
hammedans of  Sumatra,  indeed  the  only  place  in 
the  world  where  Christian  work  has  been  remark- 
ably successful  among  the  followers  of  that  fanat- 
ical religion.  It  has  a  fine  missionary  museum  at 
Barmen  and  reported  for  1909,  388  missionaries, 
63,562  communicants  and  an  income  of  $265,000. 


228    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Another  institution  at  Barmen,  though  not  dis- 
tinctively Reformed,  yet  finds  its  most  natural 
home  among  Reformed  surroundings,  is  the  Jo- 
hanneum.  This  institution  was  founded  at  Bonn 
by  the  late  Prof.  Christlieb,  of  the  University  of 
Bonn,  in  1886,  for  the  training  of  evangelists  and 
city  missionaries.  It  has  done  a  good  work;  but 
was  removed  about  ten  years  ago  to  Barmen, 
where  its  methods,  which  are  more  distinctively  Re- 
formed than  Lutheran,  find  a  congenial  home. 

The  Reformed  also  a  few  years  ago  founded  a 
Reformed  seminary  for  training  ministers  at  El- 
berfeld.  As  the  Reformed  Church  has  lost  its  uni- 
versities at  Heidelberg,  Marburg,  Duisburg  and 
Frankford  on  the  Oder,  and  has  now  only  an  occa- 
sional professor  of  theology  as  Professors  Goebel 
at  the  University  of  Bonn ;  Achelis  at  the  Univer- 
sity of  Marburg;  Carl  Muller  at  the  University  of 
Erlangen,  and  Smend  at  the  University  of  Stras- 
burg,  it  endeavors  to  indoctrinate  its  young  men 
in  the  Reformed  faith  by  such  theological  sem- 
inaries which  are  located  at  Elberfeld  and  Halle. 

Before  we  leave  this  northern  Rhine  district,  we 
must  not  forget  to  notice  another  remarkable  in- 
stitution,  the   product   of   a    Reformed   minister's 


The  Beautiful  Rhine-Land.  229 

work,  namely  the  great  Deaconess  movement  01 
Germany.  In  1822  a  young  minister  came  to  the 
small  Reformed  church  at  Kaiserwerth,  near  Diis- 
seldorf  named  Theodore  Fliedner.  As  Kaiserwerth 
was  mainly  Catholic,  he  had  little  to  do  and  he 
began  charitable  work.  He  began  preaching  among 
the  prisoners  at  Diisseldorf,  then  an  almost  un- 
known line  of  Christian  work.  One  day  one  of  the 
prisoners,  a  fallen  woman,  came  to  his  home  be- 
cause no  one  would  receive  her.  He  gave  her  an 
outbuilding  in  his  garden  in  which  to  live  until  a 
home  could  be  found  for  her.  Out  of  this  grew 
his  great  work.  He  soon  began  to  train  Christian 
nurses  and  also  Christian  teachers,  and  called  them 
Deaconesses.  One  day  he  astonished  the  town  by 
buying  the  largest  building  in  it  which  happened 
to  be  for  sale.  His  work  rapidly  grew.  One  build- 
ing was  added  to  another.  His  Christian  nurses 
are  found  all  over  the  world,  there  being  deaconess' 
houses  in  Constantinople,  Smyrna  and  the  far  east. 
These  Protestant  deaconesses  are  not  nuns,  for 
they  can  marry,  provided  they  give  to  their  deacon- 
ess house  a  sufficient  notice  of  their  resignation. 
In  addition  to  his  work  for  deaconesses,  he  also 
founded  other  institutions,  as  a  lunatic  asylum,  a 


230    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Magdelene  home,  a  home  for  the  aged  as  well  as 
hospitals,  where  his  deaconesses  can  be  trained. 
Fliedner  should  have  all  honor,  for  he  has  redis- 
covered the  value  of  consecrated  womanhood  to  the 
Protestant  Church. 


Chapter   V.— NORTHERN    GERMANY   AND 
BERLIN. 

THE  first  Reformed  church,  founded  in  Ger- 
many, was  founded  at  Emden,  in  the 
northwestern  corner  of  Germany.  With 
its  canals  and  vessels  right  in  its  streets  up  against 
the  buildings,  it  reminds  one  of  a  Dutch  city  in 
Germany.  It  is  the  capital  of  East  Friesland.  Those 
Frisians  were  early  known  as  a  simple  hardy  race 
and  they  showed  their  natural  inclinations  by  tak- 
ing to  the  Reformed  rather  than  the  Lutheran 
faith.  As  early  as  1526,  when  there  was  no  other 
Reformed  church  in  Germany  except  Strasburg, 
far  away,  Aportanus,  a  monk,  preached  the  doc- 
trines of  Zwingli  here,  much  to  the  scandal  of  the 
Lutherans  round  about.  This  congregation  con- 
tinued its  existence  until  in  1540  there  came  to  it, 
the  great  Polish  reformer,  John  A'Lasco. 

John  of  Lask,  for  such  his  name  means,  was  one 
of  the  most  beautiful  characters  of  the  reformation. 
A  Pole  by  birth,  he  was  destined  to  high  honors 
in  the  Catholic  Church.  But  through  fravel  in  Re- 
formed lands,  he  became  a  Humanist.  Finally, 
after  having  returned  to  Poland,  where  he  was  in 
233 


234    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

fair  way  to  the  highest  rank  as  a  spiritual  noble,  he 
gave  it  all  up,  sacrificing  home,  country,  rank  and 
friends  to  become  a  wanderer  for  the  reformation. 
He  became  a  reformer  in  three  countries,  a  fact 
true  of  no  other  reformer, — in  Germany,  England 
and  Poland.  He  proved  to  be  an  organizer  equal 
with  Calvin,  indeed  he  was  a  better  organizer  of 
the  congregation  than  Calvin  as  we  shall  see. 
When  he  came  to  Emden,  he  reorganized  (1543) 
the  Reformed  church  thoroughly.  He  gave  it  a 
catechism,  which  with  Calvin's  afterwards  became 
the  progenitor  of  the  Heidelberg  catechism.  In 
1549  he  went  to  England  and  became  pastor  of  the 
foreign  Reformed  church  there.  This  he  thorough- 
ly organized,  so  that  this  Dutch  Reformed  church 
of  Austins  Friars  in  London,  was  the  first  church 
of  the  Presbyterian  order  in  the  reformation.*  But 
when  bloody  Queen  Mary  came  to  the  throne  of 
England,  Lasco  and  his  refugee  congregation  had 
to  flee.  Sad  was  their  sailing  from  Gravesend 
September  17,  1553.  They  expected  to  land  at 
Copenhagen,  but  the  Danes  would  not  permit  them 
to  do  so  (because  they  were  Reformed)  and  drove 


*See  Book  III,  Chapter  VII. 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  235 

them  out  into  the  ocean  in  midwinter  and  storm. 
They  finally  were  permitted  to  land  at  Lubeck, 
Rostock  and  Wismar,  but  they  were  not  permitted 
to  stay  anywhere,  because  Westphal,  the  Lutheran 
zealot  of  Hamburg,  was  incensing  the  Lutherans 
everywhere  against  the  Reformed.  So  after  long 
and  severe  journeyings  in  winter,  snow  and  storm, 
they  arrived  at  Emden,  and  later  at  Frankford. 
Lasco  soon  went  to  Frankford  and  from  there  went 
back  to  Poland  (1556),  where  he  died  (1560), 
founding  there  the  Reformed  Church  of  Poland. 
Lasco  was  called  by  Erasmus,  "a  soul  without  a 
stain,"  so  beautiful  was  his  character.  From 
Lasco's  time  to  this,  the  Reformed  church  of  Em- 
den had  clung  faithfully  to  the  faith  once  delivered 
to  the  saints.  And  the  Coetus,  which  Lasco  found- 
ed in  1544  as  a  sort  of  a  quasi-synod,  still  has  its 
annual  meetings.  It,  with  the  Synod  of  Zurich  and 
the  Venerable  Company  of  Geneva,  is  the  oldest 
organization  of  the  Reformed  Church,  that  has 
come  down  to  us. 

Following  the  northern  coast  of  Germany  east- 
ward, we  come  to  Bremen,  the  largest  seaport  of 
Germany  save  Hamburg.  Though  a  modern  city, 
it  has  a  most  antique,  interesting  city-hall,  an  ob- 


236    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

ject  of  beauty.  Bremen  and  Emden  were  the  two 
Reformed  cities  on  the  north  coast  of  Germany, 
the  two  Reformed  lighthouses  along  that  coast. 
Bremen  was  at  first  a  Lutheran  city  in  the  reforma- 
tion. But  when  the  Lutherans  began  to  split  into 
high  and  low-Lutherans  or  Melancthonians,  there 
came  to  Bremen  in  1547  a  Melancthonian  preacher 
named  Albert  Hardenberg,  who  preached  to  great 
crowds  in  the  cathedral.  The  high-Lutheran  min- 
isters bitterly  attacked  him  as  departing  from  the 
Lutheran  faith  and  there  was  a  great  controversy. 
He  gained  Melancthon's  approval,  but  was  finally 
compelled  to  leave  in  1561,  although  amid  the  tears 
of  the  people.  But  his  departure  produced  a  re- 
action and  his  friend  and  supporter,  Van  Buren, 
was  elected  mayor  of  the  city.  The  low-Luther- 
ans continued  gaining  influence  until  in  1580 
Peucer  was  called  as  pastor  of  one  of  the  largest 
congregations,  the  church  of  St.  Ansgar.  Pezel 
had  been  a  Melancthonian  and  had  been  driven  out 
of  Saxony  for  it.  But  by  the  time  he  got  to  Bre- 
roan  he  was  a  good  Reformed.  He  drew  up  the 
Bremen  confession  of  faith  in  1595,"  which  commits 
the  church  to  Calvinism. 

The    next    important    period    in    the    Reformed 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  237 

church  of  Bremen  was  the  introduction  of  Pietism 
in  the  latter  part  of  the  seventeenth  century.  The- 
odore Untereyck,  to  whom  we  referred  in  connec- 
tion with  Miihlheim,  came  to  Bremen  in  1670,  as 
pastor  of  St.  Martin's  church,  and  introduced 
prayer-meetings.  His  wife  also  introduced  reli- 
gious meetings  for  girls  and  women.  Untereyck 
paid  special  attention  to  the  catechization  of  the 
young;  indeed  he  thoroughly  revolutionized  cate- 
chization. His  was  a  very  blessed  influence  in  that 
worldly  city.  While  he  was  preaching  his  earnest 
pietistic  sermons,  a  young  student  at  the  Reformed 
university  came  to  hear  him  one  Sunday,  named 
Joachim  Neander.  He  came  to  mock  (for  he  did 
not  believe  in  Pietism)  but  he  remained  to  pray. 
Untereyck's  earnest  words  so  completely  subdued 
him  that  he  melted  into  tears  at  the  prayer  after 
the  sermon.  And  after  the  service,  although  ridi- 
culed by  his  companions,  he  went  to  Untereyck's 
house  to  find  the  way  of  life.  He  became  an  ad- 
herent of  Untereyck  and  after  graduating  at  the 
university  became  rector  of  the  Reformed  gymna- 
sium at  Diisseldorf.  In  1679  he  returned  to 
Bremen  as  assistant  pastor  to  Untereyck.  Unfor- 
tunately he  died  the  next  year  at  the  early  age  of 


238    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

30,  but  not  until  he  had  given  promise  of  becom- 
ing one  of  the  greatest  of  the  German  hymn-wri- 
ters. He  published  one  of  the  first  and  best  of  the 
Reformed  hymn-books,  the  "Hymns  of  the  Cove- 
nant," for  he  aimed  to  popularize  the  Federal  the- 
ology in  music.  One  of  his  hymns  is  among  the 
greatest  in  the  German  language,  "Lobe  den  Herrn, 
den  machtigen  Konig  der  Ehren."  It  has  been 
thus  translated: 

Praise  ye  the  Lord.     He  is  King  over  all  creation, 
Praise  ye  the  Lord,  O  my  soul,  as  the  God  of  salvation, 
Join  in  the  song,  psaltry  and  harp  roll  along, 
Praise  in  your  solemn  vibration. 

It  is  somewhat  difficult  to  translate  the  German,  es- 
pecially the  metre  and  rythm  of  this  hymn,  but  it 
ranks  among  German  hymns  with  "Nun  danket  alle 
Gott"  (Now  thank  we  all  the  Lord),  of  Rinkart, 
for  these  two  are  the  two  Te  Deums  among  the 
German  hymns. 

Bremen  also  had  a  Reformed  gymnasium,  which 
grew  into  a  university,  at  which  some  prominent 
professors  of  theology  taught.  Thus  its  professor 
Martinius  was  a  delegate  to  the  synod  of  Dort. 
Later    came    Prof.    John    Koch     (Latinized    into 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  239 

Cocceius)  who  founded  the  Cocceian  or  Federal 
Theology,  taught  here  (1629-36).  Koch  rear- 
ranged the  theology  of  Calvin  according  to  the  idea 
of  the  covenants.  One  of  his  great  pupils  was 
Prof.  Frederick  A.  Lampe,  who  has  been  called 
by  Goebel  the  greatest  theologian  of  the  Reformed 
Ch,urch  of  Germany.  He  was  pastor  of  St. 
Stephen's  church  at  Bremen  and  professor  in  its 
university  (1709-20)  and  also  1727-9  when  he 
died.  He  not  merely  published  a  number  of  the- 
ological works,  but  also  the  first  Theological  Re- 
view in  1 71 8,  and  a  popular  catechism  based  on  the 
Heidelberg  Catechism,  called  the  "Milk  of  Truth." 
Lampe,  though  a  theologian,  was  also  a  Pietist  and 
to  profoundity  of  doctrine  added  practicalness  of 
method.  He  introduced  into  the  Cocceians  of  Hol- 
land, where  he  was  professor  at  Utrecht,  the  school 
of  practical  Cocceians. 

Bremen  of  to-day  has  very  little  of  the  Reformed 
consciousness.  Its  churches  have  gone  into  the 
union  with  the  Lutherans  in  Germany.  And  some 
of  its  pulpits  have  been  filled  by  even  blatant  ration- 
alists. But  it  has  had  a  fine  Evangelical  preacher 
in  Funcke,  many  of  whose  works  have  been  trans- 
lated into  English. 


240    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

There  are  several  districts  in  central  Germany, 
that  may  be  briefly  referred  to  as  being  Reformed. 
The  little  principality  in  the  northern  part  of  cen- 
tral Germany,  Lippe,  is  strongly  Reformed.  Near 
its  capital  on  a  hill,  surrounded  by  fine  forests,  is 
a  statue  to  Arminius,  or  as  the  Germans  call  him, 
Herman,  the  great  German  general,  who  in  the 
days  of  the  Romans  defeated  them.  Cassel,  the 
capital  of  Hesse-Cassel,  is  in  a  largely  Reformed 
district,  where  the  Reformed  Church  had,  early  in 
the  nineteenth  century,  380,000  adherents.  Near 
Cassel  is  the  beautiful  park,  Wilhelmshohe,  laid 
out  by  a  Huguenot.  In  the  St.  Martin's  church  at 
Cassel  is  the  tomb  of  Landgrave  Phillip,  the  Mag- 
nanimous, who  held  the  Marburg  conference  in 
1529.  His  grandson,  Landgrave  Maurice,  intro- 
duced the  Reformed  faith  into  Hesse-Cassel  in 
1604.  In  1666  a  Conference  was  held  at  Cassel, 
as  there  had  been  at  Leipsic  in  1631,  to  try  to  unite 
the  Lutherans  and  Reformed.  It  was  a  very  satis- 
factory conference,  because  of  the  kindly  and  fair 
spirit  shown  by  both  the  Reformed  and  Lutheran 
theologians,  but  it  failed  to  unite  them.  The  times 
were  not  ripe  for  it  yet.  In  Bavaria,  southern 
Germany,  is  Nuremberg,  with  its  Reformed  church. 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  241 

It  was  the  home  of  the  great  Reformed  painter  of 
the  Reformation,  Albert  Diirer;  and  also  Erlangen, 
where  at  the  university  is  a  Reformed  professor, 
formerly  Herzog  and  Ebrard  and  now  Carl  Muller. 
Leaving  central  Germany  for  eastern  Germany, 
we  come  to  Magdeburg,  where  there  are  three  Re- 
formed churches,  a  German,  French  and  Walloon, 
the  latter  made  up  of  refugees  originally  from 
Belgium  but  later  from  the  Palatinate.  Halle  also 
has  a  Reformed  congregation  in  the  cathedral.  And 
there  was  formerly  a  Reformed  gymnasium  or  the- 
ological school  there.  There  is  now  a  Reformed 
theological  seminary  there  one  of  whose  teachers 
(  who  is  also  one  of  the  pastors  at  the  cathedral) 
has  become  prominent  as  a  historian  of  Calvin, 
Prof.  A.  Lang.  He  is  also  the  author  of  an  excel- 
lent work  in  German  on  the  sources  of  the  Heidel- 
berg catechism.  We  pass  over  the  feeble  attempt 
to  introduce  Crypto-Calvinism  (secret-Calvinism) 
into  Saxony  in  1574.  By  this,  the  University  of 
Wittenberg,  which  had  been  Luther's  university, 
came  very  nearly  becoming  Reformed.  But  Crell, 
the  Crypto-Calvinistic  chancellor  of  Saxony,  paid 
forfeit  for  his  faith  by  his  life,  as  he  was  put  to 
death  by  Lutheran  Saxony.     And  Peucer,  Melanc- 


242     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

thon's  son-in-law,  a  physician,  who  was  the  head  of 
the  University  of  Wittenberg,  was  imprisoned  for 
being  a  Crypto-Calvinist  in  the  Pleissenburg  prison 
at  Leipsic  and  the  Reformed  were  driven  out  of 
Saxony.  The  neighboring  county  of  Anhalt  also 
became  Reformed,  but  owing  to  the  union  with  the 
Lutherans  in  the  nineteenth  century,  has  now  large- 
ly lost  its  Reformed  consciousness. 

We  now  eome  to  Berlin,  the  last  but  most  im- 
portant place  in  Germany.  It  is  one  of  the  great 
capitals  of  Europe,  but  located  on  an  uninteresting, 
flat  plain.  But  what  nature  has  failed  to  give, 
man's  art  has  tried  to  atone  for.  Berlin  is  filled 
with  great  buildings,  fine  museums  and  splendid 
statues. 

It  is,  however,  of  the  religious  history  of  Berlin, 
of  which  we  wish  to  speak.  The  last  of  the  great 
princes  of  Germany  to  become  Reformed  was  the 
Elector  of  Brandenburg,  who  lived  at  Berlin,  and 
who  was  the  ancestor  of  the  present  Emperor  of 
Germany.  For  half  a  century  (1 562-1613)  the 
doctrines  of  the  Reformed  Church  had  been  spread- 
ing in  Germany.  And  as  in  those  days  "like  prince, 
like  people"  was  the  law,  they  spread  from  one 
land  to  another  as  the  princes  became  Reformed. 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  243 

We  have  watched  their  spread  northward  along  the 
Rhine  from  Strassburg  and  Heidelberg  through 
the  Nassau  district  to  the  northern  Rhine  district, 
and  then  eastward  through  Bremen  Lippe  and 
Hesse-Cassel  to  Anhalt  and  Berlin. 

The  last  great  victory  for  the  Reformed  was  the 
conversion  of  Elector  John  Sigismund  of  Branden- 
burg to  the  Lutheran  faith.  Although  his  father 
had  made  him  promise  in  early  life  never  to  leave 
the  Lutheran  Church,  yet  on  the  week  before 
Christmas  (1613)  he,  in  the  palace  at  Berlin,  in 
the  White  Room  (which  has  since  become  famous 
for  its  spectre,  that  always  appears  just  before  a 
member  of  the  royal  family  dies)— in  that  room, 
he  announced  to  his  council  that  on  the  coming 
Christmas,  he  would  observe  the  Lord's  Supper 
after  the  Reformed  fashion  in  his  cathedral*  This 
meant  that  he  would  use  broken  bread  at  the  com- 
munion instead  of  wafers  as  the  Lutherans  did. 
And  this  act  signified  that  he  had  gone  over  to  the 
Reformed  faith. 

His  conversion  caused  a  great  sensation,  for  in 


*The   cathedral   then   stood   in   the   open   square  just 
south  of  the  palace.    Now  it  stands  north  of  the  palace. 


244    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

those  days  the  religion  of  the  people  was  supposed 
to  be  determined  by  the  religion  of  their  ruler.  His 
people,  who  were  strongly  Lutheran,  were  bitterly 
opposed  to  going  over  to  the  Reformed,  whom  they 
considered  heretics.  But  the  Elector  set  one  of  the 
first  examples  of  religious  liberty,*  by  proclaiming 
that  though  he  and  his  family  were  Reformed,  his 
subjects  could  remain  Lutheran.  But  as  they  were 
still  somewhat  suspicious  of  him,  a  riot  occurred, 
in  which  the  Reformed  minister,  Fink,  had  to  flee. 
The  court  churches  became  Reformed  while  the 
great  mass  of  the  people  remained  Lutheran. 

But  greater  than  Elector  John  Sigismund  was 
his  grandson,  Elector  Frederick  William,  who 
ruled  (1640-88)  and  has  been  called  "the  Great 
Elector."  He  advocated  the  same  principles  of 
religious  liberty.  There  is  a  false  story  going  the 
rounds  in  English,  that  he  persecuted  Paul  Ger- 
hardt  the  famous  German  hymn-writer  and  author 
of  the  hymn  "O  sacred  Head,  now  wounded,"  and 
drove  him  from   Berlin.     The  departure  of  Paul 


^Religious  liberty  was  not  born  in  the  Mayflower  by 
the  Pilgrims,  but  existed  in  Holland  where  they  learn- 
ed it.  Holland,  the  Canton  of  Grisons  in  Switzerland 
and  Brandenburg,  had  it  before  the  Mayflower  sailed. 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  245 

Gerhardt  was  due  to  his  own  Lutheran  bigotry,  for 
he  refused  to  obey  the  Electors  order  not  to  preach 
polemics  against  the   Reformed.     No,  the  Elector 
was  broad  in  his  sympathies,  for  when  the  Luth- 
eran  Pietists  were  driven  out   of   Saxony  by  the 
Lutherans,  he  received  them,  though  they  were  of 
another    denomination,    into    Brandenburg.         He 
gave  Spener  one  of  their  largest  churches  at  Ber- 
lin and  founded  the  University  of  Halle  for  them. 
This  does  not  look  like  bigotry.     The  Elector  was 
also  a  great  defender  of  the  Reformed  everywhere. 
When    King    Louis    XIV,    of    France,    issued    the 
Edict  of  Nantes  (1685)  driving  out  the  Reformed, 
the  Elector  answered  it  by  offering  to  all  them  an 
asylum  in  his  land.     And  they  came  by  thousands, 
filling  up  Halle  and  Magdeburg  and  a  large  part 
of   Berlin,    greatly   increasing   the   number   of   the 
Reformed.     At  Berlin  these   Huguenots,   5,000  in 
number,  settled  in  a  waste  district  along  the  river 
Spree,  called  Moabit,  which  they  soon  made  to  blos- 
som as  the  rose.     He  had  the  greatest  confidence 
in  their  integrity.     On  one  occasion  he  surprised 
his   wife   as    she   gave   her   crown- jewels   into   the 
hands  of  a  stranger.     He  asked  her,  who  the  man 
was.     She  replied,  "I  don't  know,  but  he  is  a  Hu- 


246    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

guenot."     That  was  enough.     A  Huguenot's  word 
was  as  good  as  a  bond. 

The  great  Elector  was  married  to  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  of  the  Reformed  princesses,  Louisa  Hen- 
rietta, the  daughter  of  Prince  Frederick  Henry  of 
Holland.  She  was  as  beautiful  in  character  as  in 
face, — a  Christian  saint.  She  cared  nothing  for 
fashion,  only  for  charity  and  religion.  It  is  said 
she  did  not  look  into  her  looking-glass  before  going 
to  church.  She  is  reputed,  although  it  is  now  de- 
nied, to  be  the  authoress  of  the  popular  German 
Easter  hymn,  "Jesus  meine  Zuversicht,"  which 
translated,  reads  thus :  * 

Jesus,  my  Redeemer,  lives.  . 

Christ,  my  trust,  is  dead  no  more. 
In  the  strength  this  knowledge  gives, 

Shall  not  all  our  fears  be  o'er. 
Calm,  though  death's  long  night  be  fraught, 
Still  with  many  an  anxious  thought. 

This  hymn  has  become  a  sacred  one  to  the  royal 
family  of  Prussia  and  Germany.  Queen  Louise  of 
Prussia,  the  good  angel  of  Prussia  in  the  Napol- 


*For  her  life   see   my  "Famous  Women  of  the   Re- 
formed  Church,  page  221. 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  247 

eonic  wars,  as  she  looked  at  the  picture  of  Electress 
Louisa  Henrietta  at  Charlottenburg,  spoke  most 
beautifully  and  feelingly  about  this  hymn  that  it 
had  won  such  popularity  among  the  Germans.  And 
having  praised  it,  she  then  sat  down  to  the  piano 
and  sang  it  with  her  clear,  beautiful  voice.  The 
oldest  born  of  Queen  Louise,  King  Frederick  Wil- 
liam IV,  named  the  bell,  which  he  gave  to  Oranien- 
burg  in  1850  (where  Louisa  Henrietta  had  lived), 
"Jesus  meine  Zuversicht." 

About  the  end  of  the  seventeenth  century,  the 
Electorate  of  Brandenburg  became  the  kingdom  of 
Prussia.  Of  its  kings,  Frederick  II,  or  as  he  is 
generally  called,  "Frederick  the  Great,"  is  the 
greatest.  He  was  a  splendid  statesman  and  fine 
general,  defeating  three  nations,  each  larger  than 
his  own.  But  he  had  lost  the  faith  of  his  fathers, 
in  which  he  had  been  confirmed  at  Magdeburg. 
But  though  he  denied  his  Reformed  faith  and  be- 
came a  flippant  unbeliever  like  Voltaire,  there  were 
witnesses  for  the  truth  in  his  court,  some  of  them 
Reformed.  Prince  Charles  of  Hesse,  said  of  him, 
"I  dined  with  the  king  and  after  dinner  had  a  con- 
versation with  him.  He  could  not  speak  of  reli- 
gion   without   blaspheming   and   finally   asked   me, 


248    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

"Tell  me  dear  prince,  do  you  believe  these  things." 
I  replied  in  a  firm  voice,  "Sir,  I  am  not  more  sure 
of  having  the  honor  of  seeing  you  than  I  am  that 
Jesus  lived  and  died  on  the  cross  for  us."  "Well," 
he  said,  "as  he  grasped  my  right  arm,  "you  are  the 
first  man  of  spirit,  who  has  ever  declared  such  a 
faith  in  my  hearing."  As  the  prince  went  out  he 
met  one  of  the  generals  of  the  court,  who  put  his 
hands  on  his  shoulders  and  burst  into  tears,  saying, 
"Now  God  be  praised,  I  have  lived  to  see  one  hon- 
est man  acknowledge  Christ  before  the  king's  face." 
On  another  occasion  at  the  battle  of  Leuthen,  the 
soldiers  of  Frederick  the  Great  went  into  battle 
singing  the  German  hymns.  "Shall  I  stop  them?" 
asked  one  of  his  officers.  But  Frederick  forbade 
him  to  do  it,  saying,  "With  men  like  these,  don't 
you  think  I  will  have  victory  to-day."  And  his 
pious  soldiers  gained  it  for  him  in  spite  of  his  in- 
fidelity. 

Prussia  suffered  greatly  during  the  Napoleonic 
wars.  But  when  they  were  over,  on  the  third  ter- 
centenary of  the  reformation,  in  181 7,  the  King  of 
Prussia  decided  to  unite  the  Lutheran  and  Reform- 
ed churches  in  his  dominions.  This  union,  together 
with  his  liturgy,  was  accepted  by  Prussia  and  after- 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  249 

wards  by  a  number  of  other  states  in  Germany. 
But  the  states  who  came  into  Prussia  after  1866, 
as  Hanover,  Hesse-Cassel  and  Alsace-Lorraine, 
still  retained  the  separation  of  the  Reformed  and 
Lutheran  churches.  And  many  of  the  Reformed 
churches  within  the  union,  as  at  Elberfeld,  retain 
their  own  Reformed  consciousness,  catechism  and 
rites.* 

Gradually  in  course  of  time,  three  kinds  of  Re- 
formed congregations  grew  up  in  Berlin.  The  first 
first  were  the  German  congregations,  at  the  head  of 
which  was  the  cathedral  of  the  king.  Before  the 
union  in  181 7,  there  were  a  number  of  Reformed 
churches  in  Berlin  and  some  of  the  Lutheran 
churches  had  a  Reformed  pastor  stationed  at  them 
for  preaching,  catechizing  and  visitation  of  the 
Reformed  in  their  neighorhood.  Thus  some  of  the 
most  prominent  preachers  of  Berlin  have  been  Re- 
formed, as  Theremim,  Schleiermacher,  and  now 
Dryander  the  court-preacher.  The  second  class  of 
Reformed  congregations  were  the  French  congre- 
gations, who  have  had  some  very  eloquent  preach- 
ers   as    Ancillon,    Beausobre,    Naude    and    others. 


*See   "The   Union,"   in   my  History  of   the  Reformed 
Church  of  Germany,  pages  560-585. 


250     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

When  Napoleon  came  to  Berlin,  they  remained  true 
to  Prussia,  the  land  of  their  adoption,  rather  than 
to  the  land  of  their  fathers,  France.  One  of  them, 
Erman,  a  gray-haired  pastor  of  Berlin,  had  the 
courage  to  rebuke  Napoleon  for  aspersing  the  char- 
acter of  Queen  Louise  of  Prussia.  He  seized  Na- 
poleon's arm  that  had  shaken  the  world  and  said, 
"Sir,  this  arm  is  powerful,  let  it  also  be  gracious. 
Do  not  attack  the  reputation  of  the  queen.  She  is 
an  excellent  woman."  Still  a  third  type  of  Reform- 
ed congregations  is  the  Bohemian  Reformed 
Church,  composed  of  refugees  from  the  land  of 
Huss.  They  built  a  union  church,  which  they 
named' after  Huss'  chapel  at  Prague,  the  Bethlehem 
church.  This  Bethlehem  Reformed  congregation 
still  exists  in  the  southwestern  part  of  the  city,  not 
very  far  from  the  Thiergarten  park. 

We  can  not  leave  Berlin  without  calling  atten- 
tion to  the  fact  that  Prussia  probably  owes  her 
greatness  to  her  Reformed  elements.  The  blood 
of  Coligny  came  into  the  veins  of  her  rulers 
through  Electress  Louisa  Henrietta,  and  they  have 
been  far-seeing  statesmen.  Prussia  learned  from 
the  Huguenots  who  came,  economy  and  integrity, 
self-control  and  bravery,  for  which  the  Huguenots 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  251 

were  distinguished  and  which  they  brought  with 
them  to  strengthen  that  kingdom.  And  from  a 
Swiss  Reformed  schoolmaster,  Pestalozzi,  Prussia 
got  an  idea  of  public  education,  which  has  put  her 
in  the  fore-front  of  German  states.  Compulsory 
education  was  made  possible  by  Pestalozzi's  sys- 
tem which  the  King  of  Prussia  adopted.  And 
when  the  educated  troops  of  Prussia  came  into 
battle  with  the  Austrians,  many  of  them  illiterate 
because  from  a  Catholic  land  there  was  no  question 
who  would  win  and  Prussia  deposed  Austria  from 
the  headship  of  Germany.  This  prepared  the  way 
for  her  to  become  the  ruler  of  all  Germany.  So 
she  has  our  Reformed  faith  much  to  thank,  even 
though  most  of  her  subjects  were  Lutheran. 

Before  leaving  this  description  of  Germany,  we 
may  state  that  there  are  still  found  scattered 
through  Germany  between  a  million  and  a  million 
and  a  half  of  adherents  of  the  Reformed  Church. 
Many  of  them  are  in  the  United  church  but  there 
still  exist  some  Reformed  synods  independent  of  it. 
They  are  the  Confederation  of  Lower  Saxony  (in- 
cluding Magdeburg  and  Halle)  the  synod  of  Ba- 
varia (including  Nuremberg  and  Erlangen),  the 
synod  of  Hanover  and  the  Consistory  of  Alsace- 


252     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Lorraine  (at  Strasburg).  The  synod  of  Hesse- 
Cassel  has  never  been  formally  united  with  the 
Lutheran,  although  its  university  at  Marburg  has 
become  united.  There  also  exists  a  small  denom- 
ination on  the  borders  of  Holland,  called  the  Old 
Reformed  church  of  Bentheim  and  East  Friesland. 
There  is  also  a  Reformed  organization  in  Ger- 
many, which  aims  to  gather  together  all  these 
synods  and  also  the  various  Reformed  congrega- 
tions within  the  United  church  into  an  Alliance. 
It  is  called  the  "Reformirte  Bund."  or  Reformed 
Alliance.  Of  it,  Rev.  Dr.  Brandes  of  Buckeburg 
is  president,  and  Rev.  Mr.  Calaminus  of  Elberfeld  is 
secretary.  It  was  organized  in  1884  at  Marburg 
on  the  400th  anniversary  of  the  birth  of  Zwingli, 
the  founder  of  the  Reformed  Church.  It  holds  its 
meetings  every  other  year  and  has  raised  funds  to 
aid  weak  Reformed  churches  and  been  the  means 
of  starting  several  new  congregations  as  at  Osna- 
bruck.  It  also  aids  the  Reformed  theological  sem- 
inaries at  Halle  and  Elberfeld.  Its  organ  is  the 
Reformite  Kirchenzeitung.* 


*We  have  not  in  this  book  referred  to  the  sacred 
places  of  the  Lutheran  Church,  which  is  the  larger 
church   of   Germany,   as   this   book   is   devoted   only   to 


Northern  Germany  and  Berlin.  253 

• 

the  Reformed  Church.  But  the  true  Reformed  is  in- 
terested beyond  his  own  denomination.  He  is  or 
ought  to  place  the  word  "Christian"  before  the  name 
of  his  denomination  and  be  interested  in  all  Evan- 
gelical churches.  So  we  incidentally  refer  here  to  the 
sacred  places  of  the  Lutheran  Church.  They  are 
Eisleben,  where  Luther  was  born  November  10,  1483: 
Mansfield,  where  he  spent  his  boyhood.  He  went  to 
Magdeburg  and  Eisenach  to  school,  where  he  sang 
hymns  on  the  streets  to  gain  money  for  his  education. 
Erfurt  is  where  he  attended  the  university  and  where 
he  found  the  Bible  in  its  library.  Wittenberg  is  the 
place  where  he  preached  and  nailed  the  theses  on  the 
church-door,  October  §1,  1 5 1 7,  and  burned  the  pope's 
bull.  The  castle  of  Wartburg,  near  Eisenach,  is  the 
place  where  he  translated  the  German  Bible.  At  Co- 
burg  he  remained  during  the  diet  of  Augsburg  (1530). 
Worms,  in  western  Germany,  is  the  place  where  he  de- 
fended his  doctrines  before  the  Emperor  and  where  is 
a  great  Luther-monument.  Nor  should  it  be  forgotten, 
that  Spire,  in  western  Germany,  is  the  place  of  the 
famous  Protest  (1529),  which  has  given  us  the  name  of 
Protestants,  and  where  a  fine  new  Protestant  church 
has   recently  been  erected  to  commemorate  that  event. 


CHURCH  OF  ST.   GERMAIN  L'AUXERROIS 


BOOK  III.— OTHER  EUROPEAN 
COUNTRIES 

Chapter  I.— PARIS  AND  THE  HUGUENOTS. 

PARIS  the  beautiful, — the  queen  of  European 
cities,  made  so  by  Louis  Napoleon,  the  city 
of  splendor,  gayety,  and  vice.  Of  Paris  it- 
self there  is  much  to  be  said,  but  a  guidebook,  like 
Baedekers  will  do  that.  But  the  religious  places  in 
Paris,  especially  those  of  the  Huguenot  church,  are 
not  particularly  noted  in  any  guide-book  and  we 
desire  to  give  them.  But  Paris  is  Catholic,  says  an 
objector,  has  Protestantism  anything  there?  We 
can  reply  with  the  apostle,  "Much  every  way." 
But  again  it  is  objected  that  Paris  is  the  city  of 
vice.  Yes,  but  it  has  also  much  of  virtue  in  it,  es- 
pecially as  heralded  by  the  influence  of  the  Hugue- 
not church. 

Paris  and  its  vicinity  was  the  cradle  of  the 
French  reformation.  The  Evangelical  doctrines 
were  first  taught  at  Meaux.*  There  Lefevre,  as 
early  as  1512,  five  years  before  Luther,  taught  the 


*It  is  28  miles  east  of  Paris. 
255 


256     famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

doctrine  of  justification  by  faith  and  later  converted 
Farel  from  his  papist  superstitions.  In  1529  Bish- 
op Briconnet  of  Meaux,  sent  the  translation  of  the 
Bible,  made  by  Lefevre  and  Farel,  to  Queen  Mar- 
garet of  Navarre.  In  1533  Queen  Margaret  open- 
ed the  pulpits  of  Paris  to  those  preachers,  who  in- 
clined to  Protestantism,  such  as  Rosseau  and  Cour- 
alt.  Even  .the  bishop  of  Paris  was  not  unfavorable, 
although  the  Sorbonne,  the  stronghold  of  the 
papacy,  opposed  the  act.  The  churches  of  Paris 
were  crowded  to  hear  the  new  doctrines. 

It  was  about  this  time  (1533)  that  Calvin  preach- 
ed in  Paris,  but  was  compelled  to  leave,  because 
of  his  part  in  the  oration  of  the  rector  of  the  uni- 
versity, Cop.  Then  came  the  unfortunate  affair 
of  the  placards  in  1534,  which,  by  their  attacks 
against  the  Catholics,  angered  the  king  against  the 
Evangelicals.  Queen  Margaret  withdrew  to  Beam, 
where  those  who  were  inclined  to  the  Evangelical 
doctrines  followed  her.  Later  the  persecutions  be- 
came less  as  the  king  desired  to  gain  political  favor 
with  the  Germans.  During  this  period  Protestant- 
ism again  won  many  adherents  in  Paris.  But  Cal- 
vin was  compelled  to  leave  France,  and  thus  France 
lost  her  greatest  reformer.     Still  the  reformation 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  257 

had  by  this  time  become  too  great  a  movement  to 
depend  on  one  man. 

In  1540  the  king  issued  an  edict  from  Fontain- 
bleau,  in  whose  palace  he  lived,*  against  the  Hu- 
guenots. By  1547  the  fourteen  martyrs  at  Meaux 
were  taken  to  the  market-place  and  burned.  Thus 
Meaux,  the  early  home  of  the  Reformed  doctrines, 
blotted  them  out.  On  December,  1547,  the  king 
issued  an  edict  from  Fountainbleau  against  all 
Protestant  books.  However,  in  the  next  decade, 
the  times  were  more  favorable  to  the  Huguenots, 
for  in  1555  the  Huguenots  organized  a  congrega- 
tion in  Paris  with  all  the  church-officers.  This  or- 
ganization was  copied  all  over  France  as  congre- 
gations were  organized  at  Poitiers,  Bourges  and 
elsewhere.  Finally  they  dared  even  call  a  synod 
of  these  churches  at  Paris,  which  met  March  25, 
1559.  In  the  face  of  the  gibbets,  then  reared  in 
public  places  against  Protestants,  and  in  the  face 
of  laws  that  hung  like  the  "sword  of  Damocles" 
over  them,  eleven  congregations  organized  this  first 
French  synod,  which  adopted  as  its  creed  the 
Gallic  confession.     Thus  Paris  was  not  merely  the 


*It  is  situated  about  37  miles   southeast   of  Paris. 


258    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

cradle  of  the  French  reformation,  but  also  the  place 
of  its  first  organization. 

But  this  rapid  growth  of  the  Huguenots  alarmed 
the  Catholics  and  violence  was  attempted.  In  1557 
they  made  an  open  attack  on  the  Huguenots.  The 
latter  were  gathered  early  in  September  in  a  house 
on  the  Rue  St.  Jacques  under  the  shadow  of  the 
Sorbonne.  There  were  three  or  four  hundred 
present  to  celebrate  the  Lord's  Supper.  Most  of 
them  were  of  the  upper  classes  and  the  ladies  with 
five  exceptions  were  of  noble  families.  When  they 
attempted  to  leave  the  house  at  midnight,  they  were 
greeted  by  a  shower  of  stones  and  driven  back. 
The  street  was  filled  with  armed  adversaries.  The 
gentlemen  cut  their  way  through  the  crowd ;  but 
the  rest,  mainly  women,  remained  in  the  house  till 
morning.  Then  they  were  arrested  and  thrown 
into  prison.  Three  of  them  were  put  to  death  and 
four  immolated.  Among  those  put  to  death  was 
Phillipine  of  Luns.  After  being  imprisoned  for  a 
year,  she  was  led  out  to  die.  A  priest  asked  her  if 
she  wanted  to  confess.  She  replied,  "I  continually 
confess  in  my  heart  to  my  Lord  and  am  certain  of 
forgiveness  of  sin-"  Just  before  her  tongue  was 
cut  out,  she  bravely  said,  "I  care  not  if  my  body 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  259 

suffer,  why  should  I  care  for  my  tongue?"  Then 
she  was  strangled  before  being  burned. 

But  these  persecutions  did  not  stop  the  progress 
of  Protestantism.  On  the  southern  side  of  the 
Seine  were  the  public  grounds  of  the  Pre  aux 
Clercs — a  favorite  promenade  for  the  upper  classes. 
One  afternoon  in  May,  1558,  a  few  voices  in  the 
crowd  began  singing  psalms.*  At  this,  the  walks 
and  the  games  were  forsaken.  The  Psalms  were 
caught  up  by  a  vast  concourse  of  people.  This 
singing  of  the  Psalms  was  repeated  many  succes- 
sive evenings.  The  number  of  persons  present  in- 
creased to  5-6000  persons,  many  from  the  upper 
classes  as  the  king  and  queen  of  Navarre.  The 
neighboring  Sorbonne  looked  on  all  this  as  an  open 
avowal  of  heresy.  This  happened,  however,  at  a 
time  when  the  king  was  absent  from  Paris. 

A  remarkable  scene  occurred  at  Fontainbleau, 
August  21,  1560.  The  young  King,  Francis  II, 
there  opened  the  French  assembly  by  taking  his 
seat  in  the  great  throne-room  of  the  palace.     Sud- 


*Psalm-singing  was  peculiar  to  the  Huguenots. 
Later  the  French  government  forbade  the  singing  of 
Psalms  because  they  feared  their  power  among  the 
Protestants. 


260     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

denly  Admiral  Coligny,  the  leader  of  the  Hugue- 
nots, rose,  approached  the  throne  and  presented  a 
petition  to  the  king.  All  present  were  surprised 
at  his  daring  in  doing  so,  for  the  death-penalty 
was  even  then  hanging  over  the  Huguenots  as 
heretics.  His  petition  was  a  declaration  of  the  reli- 
gious views  of  the  Huguenots  and  contained  a  re- 
quest that  they  be  permitted  to  hold  public  wor- 
ship. When  attention  was  called  to  the  fact  that 
his  petition  had  no  signatures,  he  replied,  "Give  us 
permission  to  meet  together  and  I  will  bring  you 
50,000  signatures  from  the  province  of  Normandy 
alone."  "And  I,"  interrupted  the  great  enemy  of 
the  Reformed,  the  Duke  of  Guise,  "will  find  100,- 
000  to  sign  the  opposite  with  their  blood.". 
Coligny's  daring  here  gained  for  him  what  timid- 
ity would  have  lost-  The  Catholic  Bishop  Montluc 
aided  Coligny  by  a  speech  in  which  he  inveighed 
against  the  bishops,  priests  and  cardinals  as  being 
avaricious  and  practising  usury,  simony,  etc.  Over 
against  this,  he  contrasted  the  morals  and  courage 
of  the  Huguenots  and  their  great  study  of  Scrip- 
ture. He  urged  that  a  council  be  called  to  rectify 
the  papal  abuses.  On  the  next  day  Coligny  again 
pled  that  the  Reformed  be  given  the  privilege  of 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  261 

having  churches,  or  as  these  have  come  to  be  called 
in  France,  "temples,"  a  name  the  Catholics  forced 
them  to  use,  as  if  Protestant  churches  were  pagan 
and  not  Christian.  The  situation  of  the  Reformed 
was  becoming  very  critical  when  the  young  king 
died  after  reigning  seventeen  months  and  the  next 
king,  Charles  IX,  was  also  a  boy.  So  the  Re- 
formed had  a  breathing  spell  in  their  persecutions, 
during  which  they  grew  rapidly  in  numbers  and  in- 
fluence. So  popular  did  Evangelical  preaching  be- 
come that  it  is  said  Catharine  de  Medici  threw  open 
the  pulpit  of  the  palace  at  Fontainbleau  to  Bishop 
Montluc.  He  preached  to  a  crowd,  while  the  monk 
Lebet  preached  to  an  empty  church.  A  Jesuit, 
writing  at  the  time,  says,  "Although  it  is  Lent, 
meat  is  sold  and  served  at  all  the  tables, — the  au- 
thority of  the  pope  and  the  worship  of  the  saints 
is  laughed  at  and  indulgences  and  other  ceremonies 
of  the  church  are  treated  as  superstitions." 

And  now  came  to  pass  the  greatest  political  scene 
in  the  history  of  the  French  church,  the  Coloquy  at 
Poissy.*     To  this  colloquy  was  summoned  as  the 


*It  is  located  about  seventeen  miles  west  or  a  little 
northwest  of  Paris,  just  beyond  the  famous  beautiful 
forest  of  St.  Germain,  whose  terrace  along  the  Seine 
overlooks   Paris  from  the  distance. 


262    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

chief  speaker  of  the  Reformed,  the  great  reformer, 
Beza  of  Geneva.  No  one  could  have  been  better 
suited  than  he,  for  he  was  of  commanding  pres- 
ence, extensive  learning,  quick  wit,  with  the  elegant 
manner  of  a  courtier,  yet  with  the  solemnity  of  a 
reformer.  The  colloquy  was  opened  September  9, 
1 561.  Charles  IX,  the  child-king  of  nine  years  of 
age,  sat  on  the  throne.  On  two  sides  of  the  room 
were  the  cardinals  and  below  them,  the  Catholic 
bishops  and  doctors.  Beza  entered,  together  with 
ten  Reformed  pastors  and  twenty-two  lay  deputies. 
They  were  not,  however,  permitted  to  take  their 
seats  aside  of  the  Catholic  doctors,  but  were  made 
to  stand  before  the  bar  like  criminals. 

As  they  came  in,  one  of  the  cardinals  exclaimed: 
"Here  come  the  Genevese  curs!"  Beza,  who  heard 
it,  with  unruffled  composure  replied,  "Faithful  dogs 
are  much  needed  in  the  Lord's  sheepfold  to  bark  at 
the  wolves."  He  came  forward  to  the  rail  and, 
after  briefly  addressing  the  king,  knelt  on  the  floor 
and  began  to  repeat  the  beautiful  confession  of 
sin  of  Calvin's  liturgy.  His  colleagues  knelt  to  the 
right  and  left  of  him.  Their  example  was  so  con- 
tagious that  even  the  queen-mother,  though  a  Cath- 
olic, fell  on  her  knees  and  the  bishops  were  solemn- 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  263 

ized  with  awe-  Beza,  having  prayed,  rose  from  his 
knees  and  made  a  most  elegant  and  eloquent  ad- 
dress to  the  king.  He  was  the  one  man  of  his  day 
who  could  do  this  for  he  was  a  rare  combination  of 
a  courtier,  a  literateur  and  a  theologian.  He  clearly 
stated  the  faith  of  the  Huguenots,  so  that  the  king 
might  know  what  it  was.  He  then  presented  the 
king  with  the  Huguenot  confession  of  faith.  When 
speaking  on  the  sacraments,  he  declared  that 
Christ's  body  was  as  far  removed  from  the  bread 
and  wine  of  the  supper  as  the  highest  heaven  from 
earth.  At  this  cries  of  "He  has  blasphemed,"  arose. 
The  last  part  of  his  address  was  on  the  government 
of  the  church.  He  closed  with  a  petition  that  the 
church  should  be  restored  to  its  pristine  purity. 
When  he  was  through,  there  was  a  strong  demon- 
stration by  the  cardinals,  against  what  he  said,  but 
the  queen-mother  stopped  it  and  ordered  them  to 
reply.  Cardinal  Tournon,  the  leader,  declined  to 
do  so  off-hand  and  the  conference  adjourned  to 
meet  another  day.  Beza's  speech  was  a  master- 
piece. "Would  to  God,"  said  the  Cardinal  of  Lor- 
raine, "that  he  had  been  dumb  or  we  deaf." 

Later  on,  September  16,  the  colloquy  was  again 
opened  in  the  same  hall,  before  the  same  assembly, 


264     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

except  that  in  the  meantime  Peter  Martyr,  the  dis- 
tinguished reformer  of  England  and  next  to  Calvin, 
the  leading  theologian  of  the  Reformed,  had  ar- 
rived and  was  present.  The  Cardinal  of  Lorraine 
delivered  the  reply  for  the  Catholics  defending  the 
infallibility  of  the  church,  and  the  doctrine  of  the 
real  presence  of  Christ's  body  in  the  Lord's  Sup- 
per. Beza  asked  for  an  opportunity  to  reply  pub- 
licly but  it  was  not  granted.  He  had,  however,  a 
private  discussion  with  several  of  the  Catholic 
leaders  on  the  subjects  at  issue,  in  which  he  was 
greatly  aided  by  Peter  Martyr.  But  the  conference 
failed  to  bring  peace  or  recognition  of  the  Re- 
formed by  the  Catholic  authorities.  Still  the  Re- 
formed religion  increased  in  numbers  and  influence. 
In  1 561  Huguenot  assemblies  of  eight,  ten  and, 
some  say,  of  forty  thousand  met.  To  avoid  con- 
fusion, these  were  held  outside  of  the  city  of  Paris. 
Beza  was  one  of  the  preachers-  One  assembly 
worshipped  outside  of  the  gate  St.  Antoine  at  Po- 
pincourt,  the  other  in  the  faubourg  St.  Marceau. 
Often  the  audiences  were  so  large  that  several 
ministers  preached  at  the  same  time.  In  these  as- 
semblies the  women  were  placed  in  the  centre,  then 
the  men  on  foot  and  around  the  edge  of  the  crowd 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  265 

the  armed  men  on  horseback.  At  Treves  8-9000 
assembled  to  partake  of  the  Lord's  Supper  and  the 
number  was  so  large  that  all  could  not  partake  of 
the  elements  in  one  day. 

But  the  saddest  day  of  Paris  was  August  24, 
1572,  when  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew  took 
place.  The  time  of  the  massacre  was  shrewdly 
chosen  as  most  of  the  Huguenot  nobles  were  gath- 
ered at  Paris  to  the  marriage  of  Henry  of  Navarre. 
Four  days  before  it  occurred,  Coligny  had  been 
wounded  by  a  shot  which  broke  a  finger.  The  sig- 
nal for  the  massacre  was  the  ringing  of  the  bell 
of  the  church  of  St.  Germain  L'  Auxerrois,  just 
east  of  the  palace  of  the  Louvre.  Then  the  bell  of 
the  Palace  of  Justice  pealed  out  and  the  massacre 
became  general.  Bodies  of  Huguenots  were  drag- 
ged from  all  quarters  to  the  square  in  front  of  the 
Louvre.  Coligny  was  assassinated,  the  king  finally 
giving  his  consent,  but  with  the  words,  "Then  the 
massacre  must  not  stop  till  every  other  Huguenot 
is  dead  lest  they  accuse  me.  As  the  soldiers  burst 
into  his  house,  Admiral  Coligny  asked  what  was 
the  cause  of  the  disturbance.  One  of  his  attendants 
replied,  "My  lord,  it  is  God  that  is  calling  us  to  him- 
self.    The  house  has  been  forced  and  we  have  no 


266    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

means  of  resistance."  Coligny  nobly  replied,  "For 
a  long  time  I  have  kept  myself  in  readiness  for 
death-  As  for  you,  save  yourselves  if  you  can." 
They  fled  and  escaped.  He  added:  "My  soul  I 
commend  to  the  mercy  of  God."  When  the  soldiers 
entered  his  room,  he  was  quickly  killed  and  his 
body  thrown  into  the  street.  For  four  days,  the 
massacre  continued,  until  the  streets  ran  red  with 
blood.  Among  the  victims  were  a  number  of  Hu- 
guenots of  high  rank,  who  were  lodged  in  the 
Louvre  palace  and  who  were  put  to  death,  the  only 
ones  spared  being  Henry  of  Navarre  and  the  Prince 
of  Conde.  Great  was  the  rejoicing  of  the  Catholics 
at  this  massacre.  They  celebrated  a  great  jubilee, 
their  pulpits  echoed  with  thanksgivings.  They  had 
a  medal  struck  to  commemorate  it.  At  Rome  the 
pope  offered  Te  Deums  and  had  the  cannon  fired 
in  honor  of  it.  The  king  of  France  has  a  jubilee 
procession  on  August  28,  Thursday,  1572.  It  is 
a  remarkable  fact  that  almost  all  the  actors  of  this 
massacre  died  violent  deaths,  and  the  king  died  in 
great  remorse.  When  the  Duke  of  Anjou  passed 
through  Germany  the  next  year,  he  visited  the 
Elector  of  the  Palatinate  at  Heidelberg.  The  lat- 
ter showed  him  a  portrait  of  Coligny  in  his  castle, 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  267 

"You  know  that  man?"  asked  the  Elector,  "you 
have  put  to  death  the  greatest  captain  in  Christen- 
dom. You  ought  not  to  have  done  so,  for  he  has 
done  you  and  your  king  great  service."  The  duke 
made  a  confused  reply  and  shrugged  his  shoulders 
at  the  rebuke." 

But  persecution  could  not  destroy  the  Huguenot 
church,  it  only  roused  her  to  greater  life  and  activ- 
ity. Then  came  the  period  of  the  Huguenot  wars 
between  the  Catholics  and  the  Protestants,  the  lat- 
ter led  by  the  Prince  of  Conde  and  later  by  King 
Henry  of  Navarre.  Little  by  little  the  Huguenots 
gained  on  their  enemies,  until  in  1589  the  army  of 
the  weak  King  of  France  was  beaten,  and  the 
Huguenot  forces  42,000  strong  were  at  the  very 
gates  of  Paris.  Then  came  the  death  of  King 
Henry  III.  The  next  step  was  the  accession  of 
Henry  of  Navarre  to  the  French  throne  as  Henry 
IV-  And  then  came  his  perversion  to  Catholicism. 
But  he  became  a  liberal  Catholic  and  hoped  to  se- 
cure toleration  to  the  Huguenots  by  granting  to 
them  the  Edict  of  Nantes  in  1597.  Under  it  the 
Reformed  felt  secure  and  there  was  Protestant 
worship  in  760  churches. 

On  May  4,  1600,  a  conference  was  held  at  Fon- 


268    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

tainbleau  betwieen  Duplessis  Mornay,  a  leading 
Huguenot,  and  Duperron.  The  former,  in  his 
work  on  the  Lord's  Supper  had  collected  5-6000 
passages  from  the  early  Church-Fathers  against  the 
Catholic  doctrine  of  trans-substantiation.  Henry 
IV  was  displeased  at  it  and  so  told  Mornay,  who 
replied,  "I  have  always  regulated  my  service  first 
to  God,  next  to  my  king  and  then  to  my  friends. 
Duperron,  bishop  of  Evreux,  declared  that  he  had 
found  in  Mornay's  book,  500  enormous  errors.  So 
the  king  ordered  a  conference,  but  was  careful  to 
select  as  judges  four  ultra-Catholics,  two  doubtful 
ones,  and  no  Huguenots.  Besides  Mornay  was 
placed  at  a  disadvantage,  for  he  was  not  told  till 
the  clay  of  the  conference  at  1  a.  m.,  the  particular 
passages  that  would  be  called  in  question.  He, 
therefore,  had  little  time  to  prepare.  As  a  result 
he  made  a  poor  showing  at  the  conference.  Mor- 
nay got  sick  that  night  and  the  conference  was  call- 
ed off.  Out  of  several  thousand  passages 
against  the  Catholics  in  his  book,  the  judges  con- 
demned nine.  Later,  however,  Mornay  published 
a  new  edition  of  his  work  on  the  Lord's  Supper  and 
in  it  verified  his  quotations. 

In  1606  the  Reformed  congregation  at  Paris  was 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  269 

allowed  to  have  its  own  church  building.  They  had 
never  been  allowed  to  worship  in  Paris  by  the 
French  government.  They  had  first  been  obliged 
to  worship  in  the  little  village  of  Ablon,  nine  and  a 
half  miles  south  of  Paris.  The  Huguenot  nobles 
then  complained  that  they  could  not  on  the  same 
day  perform  their  duties  to  their  God  and  to  their 
king.  The  poor  also  complained  of  the  distance, 
and  some  infants  carried  to  the  church  for  baptism 
died  on  the  way.  So  the  king,  in  1606,  granted 
them  permission  to  build  a  temple  at  Charenton, 
now  the  southeastern  suburb  of  Paris-  There  they 
built  an  enormous  church  holding  eight  thousand 
people.  And  as  they  went  to  and  fro  to  church, 
they,  by  the  elegance  of  their  equippages,  excited 
the  envy  of  the  Catholics.  Several  of  the  national 
synods  of  the  French  Reformed  church  were  held 
at  Charenton. 

But  in  16 10,  Henry  IV  was  assassinated,  and 
what  he  did  for  the  Huguenots,  it  was  left  for  his 
successors  to  undo.  Gradually  the  oppressions  be- 
came greater  until  about  1680  the  dragonades  be- 
come prominent.  And  in  1685  King  Louis  XIV  is- 
sued his  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  which 
forbade  Protestantism  in  France.     One  of  the  first 


270     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

acts  that  marked  this  edict  was  the  utter  demolition 
of  the  Huguenot  temple  at  Charenton.  When  this 
church  was  destroyed,  in  the  French  Academy 
(which  strange  to  say  was  originally  founded  by  a 
Huguenot),  there  was  an  address,  in  which  Abbe 
Tallemand  said:  "Happy  ruins,  the  finest  trophy 
France  ever  held."  As  the  members  of  this  con- 
gregation did  not  obey  the  king's  order  to  become 
Catholics,  one  hundred  of  the  leaders  were  locked 
up  by  the  police,  and  not  left  out  until  they  had 
signed  an  act  of  union  with  the  Catholics.  But 
later  the  Reformed  there  were  treated  with  pecu- 
liar leniency  so  as  to  spare  King  Louis  XIV  dis- 
agreeable thoughts.    Their  presence  was  ignored. 

About  five  miles  north  of  Paris  is  St.  Denis, 
long  the  burial-place  of  the  French  kings.  And 
there  King  Louis  XIV  was  buried.  But  there  oc- 
curred one  of  the  revenges  of  history.  On  Oc- 
tober 12,  1793,  his  tomb  was  desecrated  in  the 
days  of  the  French  revolution  by  order  of  the 
French  Convention,  just  a  century  to  the  very  day, 
after  he  had  caused  the  tombs  of  the  German  kings 
to  be  similarly  deserated  in  the  cathedral  of  Spire 
in  Germany.  Strange  to  say,  the  man  who  dese- 
crated his  tomb  was  named  Hentz,  a  namesake  of 
the  man  who  did  the  same  at  Spire.    When  in  1787 


Paris  and  tlic  Huguenots.  271 

the  Edict  of  Toleration  became  a  law,  the  Prot- 
estants in  Paris  again  had  the  oportunity  to  organ- 
ize, which  they  did.  There  are  now  in  Paris  nine 
French  Reformed  or  Huguenot  churches.  Of  the 
five  Huguenot  churches  in  Paris  the  most  promi- 
nent is  the  Oratoire,  just  north  of  the  Louvre  pal- 
ace. Its  buildings  originally  belonged  to  the  Catho- 
lics, having  been  erected  1621-30.  In  its  rear  on  the 
street  Rue  de  Rivoli  is  the  statue  of  Coligny,  placed 
not  far  from  where  he  was  assassinated.  There 
are  also  in  Paris  five  congregations  of  the  Free 
Reformed  Church  of  France. 

Two  interesting  undenominational  organizations 
exist  in  Paris,  which  are  mainly  controlled  by  the 
Reformed  or  mainly  aid  them.  The  first  is  the 
Paris  Missionary  Society.  This  was  organized  in 
1824  after  the  revival  at  Geneva  had  touched 
France.  This  society  founded  a  mission  among  the 
Basutoes,  in  South  Africa  and  this  led  later  to  the 
foundation  of  a  mission  among  the  Barotsis  of 
eastern  Africa.  As  France  gained  more  colonies 
this  society  enlarged  its  missionary  work  in  those 
colonies  as  Madegascar,  etc.*  The  greatest  of  their 
early  missionaries  was  Casalis,  who  went  to  South 


*Its    office    is    in    southern    Paris    at  ■  102    Boulevard 
Arago. 


272     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Africa  in  1832,  just  as  a  heathen  chief,  Moshesh, 
1,200  miles  in  the  interior,  had  sent  to  Cape-town 
for  a  teacher.  He  located  in  Moshesh's  tribe,  the 
Basutoes,  and  founded  the  first  mission  station 
named  Moriah.  Moshesh  was  one  of  the  most 
prominent  and  progressive  chiefs  of  South  Africa, 
and  finally  became  a  Christian  just  before  his  death. 
Casalis  was  followed  by  Mabille  and  others.  By 
1888,  out  of  a  population  of  200,000,  25,000  were 
adherents  of  this  mission.  This  Basuto  mission  has 
proved  an  important  political  factor,  although  that 
was  not  originally  intended.  When  the  Basuto 
tribe  found,  that  for  their  own  protection,  they 
must  place  themselves  under  a  foreign  power,  nat- 
urally they  would  have  turned  to  France.  But 
these  missionaries  did  not  trust  France,  as  France 
was  the  favorite  daughter  of  the  pope  at  that  time, 
and  they  feared  France  would  send  the  Jesuits 
among  the  Basutoes.  So,  through  their  influence, 
the  Basutoes  went  under  the  British  control,  as 
they  were  afraid  France  would  make  them  Catho- 
lic. Thus  England  gained  one  of  the  finest  races 
in  South  Africa  through  this  mission. 

But  the  greatest  missionary  of  this  Paris  So- 
ciety, was  Francis  Coillard,  who  went  to  Africa 
in  1857.     He  labored  at  first  among  the  Basutoes. 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  273 

The  Christian  Basutoes  heard  that  there  was  a  tribe 
north  of  them,  who  spoke  the  same  language.  And 
they  determined  that,  as  they  had  found  such  a 
great  blessing  in  Christianity,  it  was  their  duty  to 
make  it  known  to  that  tribe,  especially  as  they  spoke 
their  language-  So  they  started  their  own  foreign 
mission  and  in  1884,  Coillard  and  his  wife  started 
far  to  the  north,  one  thousand  miles  to  the  region 
of  the  Zambesi.  There  Coillard  founded  a  mission 
among  the  Barotsis  whose  king,  Lewanika,  at  first 
received  him  in  a  friendly  way,  but  then  for  years 
ridiculed  and  hindered  his  work.  But  the  king's 
son  and  heir  to  the  throne,  Litia,  became  a  Chris- 
tian. The  heavenly  death  of  Mrs.  Coillard  pro- 
duced a  profound  impression  on  the  natives  and  the 
mission  has  steadily  grown.  The  Barotsis  followed 
the  Basutos  in  placing  themselves  under  the  British 
crown.  And  at  the  recent  coronation  of  King  Ed- 
ward VII  of  England,  one  of  the  foreign  kings, 
who  attracted  great  attention  was  Lewanika,  the 
king  of  this  tribe.  Though  not  yet  a  Christian,  he 
declared  that  "the  Gospel  was  the  power  of  God." 
Coillard  died  a  few  years  ago.*    When  Madegascar 


*For  the  lives  of  these  remarkable  missionaries  see 
"Famous  Missionaries  of  the  Reformed  Church,"  by 
the  author  of  this  work. 


274    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

came  under  French  control,  the  missions  of  the 
London  Missionary  Society  were  transferred  to  it. 
But  there  has  been  great  oppression  by  the  French 
governors  of  that  island,  which  has  seriously  inter- 
fered with  the  missionary  work  of  the  Paris  so- 
ciety. 

The  other  undenominational  movement  is  the 
McAll  Mission,  founded  by  Rev.  Robert  McAll,  a 
Congregationalist  minister  of  England,  who  had  oc- 
casion to  visit  Paris  just  after  the  Commune  in 
August,  1 87 1,  when  he  went  to  Belleville,  the  part 
of  Paris  that  had  been  the  home  of  Commune. 
While  distributing  tracts  at  the  door  of  a  res- 
taurant, a  workman  grasped  his  hand  and  asked 
him  to  come  and  tell  them  the  true  religion,  one 
without  forms  and  ceremonies.  Those  words  were 
his  call.  He  went  to  Paris,  in  January,  1872,  and 
opened  his  first  Gospel  hall.  At  first  he  was  look- 
ed upon  with  suspicion  by  the  French  authorities, 
who  stationed  policemen  at  his  hall,  that  nothing 
might  be  said  against  the  government.  But  often 
it  happened  that  the  policeman,  who  came  to  watch, 
was  converted.  The  French  government  later  rec- 
ognized the  value  of  the  Mc'All  movement  to  pub- 
lic morals  by  conferring  on  him  the  cross  of  the 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  275 

Legion  of  Honor  in  1892.  At  first  the  McAll  meet- 
ings had  only  singing  and  an  address,  but  no  prayer, 
for  fear  there  might  be  a  disturbance  as  the  French 
were  not  accustomed  to  have  any  one  pray  but  the 
priests.  But  gradually  a  free  prayer  was  intro- 
duced, and  many  other  halls  were  opened-  As  the 
work  grew,  the  utter  simplicity  of  the  service  and 
the  plainness  of  the  halls  proved  attractive  to  the 
French,  wearied  with  the  pomp  of  the  Catholic  cer- 
emonial. The  work  spread  to  other  cities,  being 
liberally  supported  from  the  British  Isles  and 
America.  It  prospered  greatly  till  the  death  of  Mr. 
McAll  in  1893.  Since  then  it  has  still  been  con- 
tinued although  the  number  of  halls  has  somewhat 
diminished ;  but  it  has  added  to  its  work  a  Gospel- 
boat,  on  the  river  Seine,  which  goes  from  place  to 
place  and  holds  religious  services. 

The  McAll  Mission  has  done  an  excellent  work, 
attracting  many  to  the  Gospel  who  never  would 
otherwise  have  heard  it.  The  main  difficulty  with  it 
has  been  to  connect  it  with  churches.  A  few  of  the 
halls  were  connected  with  some  particular  church, 
and  an  attempt  was  made  to  hold  the  converts  of 
the  others  in  Brotherhoods.  But  Mr.  McAll  had 
to  confess  that  this  link  with  the  church  was  the 


2"/6    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

weakest  part  of  the  movement.  A  few  went  into 
the  Baptist  church ;  a  few  went  into  the  Methodist. 
Probably  the  most  went  into  some  Reformed 
church,  but  the  great  body  did  not  identify  them- 
selves with  any  church,  and  so  conserve  their  in- 
fluence for  Christ.  One  of  the  leading  ministers 
of  the  French  Reformed  church,  while  not  criti- 
cizing the  movement,  yet  said  that  if  the  same 
amount  of  money,  which  had  been  spent  in  the 
McAll  Mission,  had  been  given  to  the  different 
Home  Missionary  Societies  of  the  French  Re- 
formed church,  it  would  have  produced  far  greater 
and  more  permanent  results,  in  the  formation  of 
new  congregations,  etc.  But  then  it  is  possible 
that  so  much  money  could  not  otherwise  have  been 
raised  in  Britain  and  America,  for  the  McAll 
Movement  seemed  especially  to  appeal  to  these 
lands.* 

There  has  been  a  continued  and  growing  drift 
out  of  the  Catholic  Church  in  France.  Perhaps 
the  most  important  has  been  the  recent  movement 
of  the  priests  out  of  that  Church,  some  because 
they  have  lost  faith  in  Catholicism,  some  because, 


*McAll    Mission    stations    can    be    found    at    23    Rue 
Royale,  8  Boulevard  Nouvelle  and  104  Rue  St.  Antoine. 


Paris  and  the  Huguenots.  277 

with  the  wane  of  Catholicism,  fewer  priests  were 
needed.  Two  Homes  have  been  established  by 
Protestants  for  them  because  their  education  has 
fitted  them  only  for  the  priesthood  and  they  would 
starve  until  they  could  find  work  of  some  kind. 
One  of  these  homes  is  connected  with  the  Hugue- 
nots, the  other,  under  the  former  Abbe  Bourrier, 
is  independent.  But  both  are  doing  an  important 
work.* 

We  thus  see  that  even  gay  Paris  yet  yields  much 
of  interest  to  the  Christian  and  the  follower  of 
Calvin.  The  memory  of  the  Huguenots  should  be 
a  spiritual  tonic  to  the  visitor  to  Paris  or  to  the 
reader  of  these  pages.  Not  all  of  Paris  is  bad, — 
there  is  much  good,  and  there  will  be  more  in  the 
future,  as  more  and  more  the  true  spiritual  reli- 
gion of  the  Huguenots  gains  greater  power  there. 


*A  very  interesting  memorial  of  the  Huguenots  is 
the  valuable  library  of  the  Huguenot  Society,  54  Rue 
des  Saint  Peres  VII,  where  the  learned  librarian,  Rev. 
N.  Weiss,  welcomes  and  aids  any  one  interested  in 
Huguenot  researches.  The  Protestant  book-store  is 
near  the  Palais  Royal  at  4  Place  du  Theatre  Francais, 
where  English  is  spoken,  and  any  information  about 
the  Huguenots  will  be  gladly  given. 


Chapter   II.— FRANCE   AND   THE    HUGUE- 
NOTS. 

BUT  while  Paris  and  its  vicinity  was  the 
birthplace  of  the  Huguenots,  it  did  not 
represent  the  whole  movement.  The  ref- 
ormation was  a  spontaneous  movement  in  many 
parts  of  France,  a  revulsion  against  the  supersti- 
tions and  abuses  of  the  papacy.  There  was  a  great 
desire  for  the  Gospel  liberty  of  Protestantism. 
France  is  full  of  sacred  places  in  Huguenot  history. 
We  can  give  but  a  brief  outline  of  the  history  of 
the  Huguenots  and  a  brief  reference  to  the  most 
important  of  their  sacred  places. 

The  history  of  the  Huguenots  may  be  divided 
into  three  main  periods : 

i.  The  Rise  of  the  Huguenots. 

2-  The  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  and 
their  persecution. 

3.  Their  condition  after  the  Edict  of  Tolera- 
tion. 

1.  The  Rise  of  the  Huguenots. 

With  the  organization  of  the  Huguenot  Church 
at  Paris  in  1559,  the  Huguenot  movement  became 
279 


280    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

a  formidable  one  to  the  Catholics.  A  large  part 
of  the  best  citizens  of  France  had  become  identi- 
fied with  them,  especially  those  of  the  industrious 
artizan  class,  and  also  the  best  of  the  nobility. 
Their  numbers  were  so  great  that  it  looked  as  if 
France,  like  Germany,  was  about  to  revolt  from 
the  pope.  Nothing  but  the  continued  adherence  of 
the  king  to  Catholicism  saved  France  to  the  papacy. 
The  death  of  King  Francis  I  in  1559,  caused  two 
children  in  succession  to  be  placed  on  the  throne. 
During  that  time  the  Reformed  doctrines  spread 
amazingly.  In  1561  occurred,  as  we  have  seen,  the 
colloquy  at  Poissy.  In  that  year  also,  Peter  Viret 
the  reformer  of  French  Switzerland,  and  the  com- 
panion of  Calvin  and  Farel,  in  that  work,  came  to 
southern  France  to  live.  He  greatly  strengthened 
the  French  Protestants,  by  his  preaching.  He  be- 
came professor  of  theology  at  Orthez  and  died 
there.  He  was  a  great  reformer.  Although  he 
had  not  the  profundity  of  Calvin,  or  the  vehemence 
of  Farel,  yet  he  had  an  unction  of  his  own  (a 
sweetness),  so  that  the  people  never  tired  of  hear- 
ing him. 

The   Huguenot   movement   had   grown   to   such 
proportions  as  to  alarm  the  Catholics,  and  the  Duke 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  281 

of  Guise  and  the  queen-mother  determined  its  prog- 
ress must  be  stopped.  Suddenly  there  came  a  thun- 
derclap out  of  a  clear  sky — the  grim  prophecy  of 
future  bloodshed  for  many  years.  In  1562,  while 
1,200  Huguenots  were  worshipping  at  Vassy  in  a 
barn,  the  Duke  of  Guise  fell  on  them  with  his 
troops  and  killed  sixty  and  wounded  two  hundred. 
This  high-handed  act  greatly  alarmed  the  Hugue- 
nots, and  the  Consistory  of  the  Paris  congregation 
sent  Beza  to  complain  to  the  court,  where  the  reply 
was  made  that  the  Duke  of  Guise,  having  been  in- 
sulted by  the  Huguenots,  could  not  restrain  his 
troops.  But  the  Huguenots  now  felt  that  their 
cause  was  endangered.  This  massacre  might  be  re- 
peated at  any  time.  Hence,  driven  to  desperation, 
they  finally  had  recourse  to  arms.  Then  occurred 
what  have  been  called  the  eight  wars  of  the  Hugue- 
nots, which  changed  from  being  a  religious  organi- 
zation (out  of  self-defense)  into  a  political  one. 
There  is  no  time  to  speak  of  all  these  wars,  only 
of  the  most  important.  Suffice  it  to  say  that  they 
were  battles  for  the  toleration  of  the  Huguenot 
worship. 

The  first  war  occurred  1562-3.    During  this  war, 
Rouen,  in  the  north  of  France,  was  beseiged  by  the 


282     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Catholic  armies.  The  Queen  of  England  allied 
herself  with  the  Huguenots.  But  after  a  brave  de- 
fence of  five  weeks,  the  city  fell.  The  Huguenots 
were  destroyed  and  some  of  them  hung,  among 
them  their  pastor,  Marlorat.  Toulouse,  too,  in 
southern  France  had  to  undergo  the  baptism  of 
fire.  There  were  25,000  Huguenots  in  that  dis- 
trict. The  Reformed  were  beseiged  in  the  city  hall 
and  were  finally  compelled  to  surrender.  They  cel- 
ebrated the  Lord's  Supper,  then  marched  out,  when 
3,500  were  killed  and  700  put  to  death.  But  when 
the  war  closed,  the  Huguenots  gained  the  privilege 
of  having  the  right  to  worship  in  the  cities  then  in 
the  hands  of  the  Huguenots. 

In  the  second  Huguenot  war  (1567),  the  Hugue- 
nots rose  everywhere  against  the  Catholic  authori- 
ties. They  were  strong  enough  to  beseige  Paris, 
and  fought  the  battle  of  St.  Denis,  just  north  of 
Paris,  where  the  French  lost  their  great  leader, 
Montmorency.  The  third  war  occurred,  1568.  It 
was  during  this  war  that  Jeanne  D'Albret,  Queen 
of  Navarre,  allied  herself  with  the  Huguenots- 
Her  little  kingdom  of  Navarre  was  located  south- 
west of  France  on  the  borders  of  the  Pyrenees. 
The  reformation  early  appeared  there,  but  she  did 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  283 

not  profess  the  Reformed  faith  until  1560,  when 
she  called  Yiret  to  her  land.  What  Joan  of  Arc 
had  been  to  the  French  before,  Jeanne  D'  Albret 
now  became  to  the  Huguenots.  The  Huguenot 
leaders  during  this  war  had  thrown  themselves  into 
the  city  of  Rochelle  in  southwestern  France,  on  the 
coast.  When  she  joined  them  at  Rochelle  with  her 
army  of  4,000  men,  they  were  besides  themselves 
with  joy.  The  Prince  of  Conde  in  the  Huguenot 
assembly,  arose  and  resigned  the  command  of  the 
Huguenot  army  in  favor  of  her  son,  Henry  of 
Navarre.  But  she  declined  that  honor  for  her  son, 
saying  "I  and  my  children  are  here  to  promote  the 
cause  or  to  share  in  its  disaster.  The  cause  of  God 
is  dearer  to  me  than  the  aggrandizement  of  my 
son."  Rochelle  from  this  time  became  the  citadel 
of  the  Huguenots.  During  this  war,  occurred  the 
terrible  battle  of  Jarnac,  where  the  prince  of  Conde, 
the  leader  of  the  Huguenots,  was  killed.  This  so 
paralyzed  the  Huguenot  army  that  even  Coligny 
could  not  raise  their  courage.  In  despair,  the  Hu- 
guenots leaders  sent  to  Rochelle  for  Jeanne  D' 
Albret  to  come  to  the  army.  She  came  and  made 
such  an  eloquent  appeal  to  the  soldiers  that  tre- 
mendous   enthusiasm   was    aroused    and   her   son, 


284    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Henry,  was  made  leader  of  the  army.  The  tide  of 
battle  turned,  and  the  Huguenot  army  pushed  to- 
ward Paris,  with  the  result  that  when  peace  was 
declared,  it  was  still  more  favorable  to  the  Re- 
formed, as  it  gave  them  twelve  places  where  Re- 
formed worship  might  be  enjoyed,  although  it  ex- 
cluded their  worship  from  Paris  by  ten  leagues. 
Four  places  were  given  outright  to  them,  Rochelle, 
Montauban,  Charente  and  Cognac.  The  Huguenot 
faith  had  so  spread  that  in  1 571  there  were  2,150 
churches. 

Between  the  third  and  fourth  wars  occurred  the 
awful  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew  in  1572,  to 
which  we  have  already  referred.  For  six  weeks  it 
continued  through  the  provinces.  Massacres  took 
place  at  Meaux,  Orleans,  Rouen,  Toulouse,  Bor- 
deaux, Lyons  and  many  other  places.  The  severity 
of  this  massacre  varied  in  different  places-  Where 
the  Huguenots  were  numerous  and  influential,  its 
severity  was  checked.  It  was  the  cities  more  es- 
pecially that  suffered,  the  massacre  not  being  so 
general  in  the  country  districts.  Seventy  thousand 
Huguenots  lost  their  lives  in  this  massacre.  This 
massacre  thoroughly  alarmed  the  Huguenots.  They 
now  fully  realized  that  the  Catholics  had  no  other 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  285 

object  but  their  destruction.  It  led  to  the  fourth 
war  in  1573-4.  The  Huguenots  threw  themselves 
into  Rochelle  whose  seige  began  Dec.  4,  1572.  They 
defended  themselves  with  the  greatest  bravery,  even 
the  women  signalizing  themselves  as  warriors.  The 
English  tried  to  relieve  the  city  with  food  but  failed. 
Gaunt  famine  soon  became  terrible,  so  that  horses, 
cats  and  dogs  were  eaten.  Pestilence  came,  but  they 
battled  on  through  the  following  summer  and  did 
not  surrender.  Finally  the  war  closed,  for  Henry  of 
Anjou  (one  of  the  Catholic  leaders)  was  made 
king  of  Poland.  France  now  gave  liberty  of  wor- 
ship to  the  Reformed  religion  in  three  places, 
Rochelle,  Montauban  and  Nismes,  and  in  the  houses 
of  the  Reformed  nobles. 

The  fifth  war  (1575-6)  was  not  important  in  its 
battles,  but  important  in  its  results,  for  by  it  free- 
dom of  worship  was  given  the  Huguenots  through- 
out France,  except  in  Paris  and  places  of  royal 
residence.  The  next  king,  Henry  III,  disapproved 
of  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew,  and  repealed 
the  sentence  against  Coligny  and  the  Huguenot 
leaders.  The  sixth  war  (1577)  led  to  the  defeat 
of  the  Huguenots  and  reduced  their  places  of  wor- 
ship to  certain  places  where  the  Huguenot  nobles 


2<S6    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

lived.  By  this  time  both  parties  were  sick  of  the 
wars,  so  that  when  the  seventh  war  (1580)  oc- 
curred, most  of  the  Huguenots  did  not  take  part, 
and  the  French  army  was  successful,  though  its 
peace  gave  the  same  rights  to  the  Huguenots  as 
the  sixth  war.  Meanwhile  the  death  of  the  Duke 
of  An j 011  made  Henry  of  Navarre  the  apparent 
heir  to  the  French  throne. 

The  eightfo  war,  called  "the  War  of  the  three 
Henrys,"  broke  out  in  1587,  during  which  Henry 
of  Navarre  steadily  gained  the  victory.  During 
this  war  was  fought  the  celebrated  battle  k  of 
Courtras  where  5-6000  Huguenots  were  pitted 
against  10-12000  French  soldiers.  But  the  former 
were  veterans  while  the  latter  were  many  of  thern 
only  gay  cavaliers.  As  the  battle  was  about  to 
begin  the  Reformed  knelt  and  chanted  the  118th 
Psalm.  The  French  soldiers,  seeing  them  kneel, 
cried  out,  "They  are  afraid,  the  cowards,  they  are 
confessing."  "No,"  said  an  old  soldier  among  them, 
"when  the  Huguenots  do  this,  they  will  fight  well." 
And  they  did,  for  they  completely  routed  their  ene- 
mies. Meanwhile  the  King  of  France  was  driven 
out  of  Paris  by  a  revolt,  so  that  finally  he  had  to 
call  to  his  aid  his  old  enemy  Henry  of  Navarre. 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  287 

They  beseiged  Paris  but  during  the  seige  the  King 
of  France  was  assassinated. 

The  death  of  the  King  of  France  threw  every- 
thing into  confusion.  The  heir  to  the  throne  was 
the  Protestant  King  of  Navarre.  Finally,  on  July 
25,  1593,  Henry  of  Navarre  abjured  his  Protestant 
faith  and  became  king  of  France,  and  in  1594  en- 
tered Paris.  He  proved  a  liberal  ruler,  giving  to 
the  Huguenots  toleration.  He  endeavored  to  make 
permanent  their  liberty  of  worship  in  the  Edict  of 
Nantes,  which  was  promulgated  April  13,  1598. 
He  thus  hoped  to  atone  to  them  for  his  perversion 
to  Rome.  But  it  did  not  occur  to  him  that  after 
his  time,  some  other  king  might  undo  what  he  did, 
as  his  successor  Louis  XIV  did  in  1685.  Still  this 
edict  gave  the  Huguenots  much  liberty  for  nearly 
a  century.  His  life  was  cut  short  by  assassination 
in  1610. 

2.  The  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes   (Octo- 
ber 18,  1685). 

The  assassination  of  King  Henry  IV,  caused  the 
Huguenots  to  lose  their  protector.  They  had  by 
this  time  become  greatly  weakened-  Their  greatest 
leaders  had  either  died  or  become  perverts  to  Cath- 


288    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

olicism  like  the  king.  Besides,  in  the  progress  of 
events,  they  had  become  a  political  movement,  rath- 
er than  a  religious  one.  So  that  when  the  foxy- 
cardinal  Richelieu  became  prime  minister,  he  paved 
the  way  for  their  destruction.  He  determined  to 
destroy  their  power  by  capturing  their  citadel, 
Rochelle.  Even  before  this  happened,  in  1620, 
persecutions  broke  out  in  Beam  in  southwestern 
France,  which  with  Navarre  had  been  added  to 
France  by  Henry  IV.  The  Catholic  soldiers  burst 
into  the  Reformed  churches,  breaking  down  their 
walls,  tearing  up  their  books,  forcing  the  Reformed 
to  kneel,  when  the  host  was  carried  through  the 
streets,  and  also  to  make  the  sign  of  the  cross. 
They  drove  away  the  Reformed  ministers.  This 
was  the  first  of  the  dragonades,  the  percursor  of 
all  the  rest  that  afterwards  came  with  such  terrible 
results  to  the  Huguenots.  Richelieu's  seige  of 
Rochelle  soon  led  to  a  famine.  The  British  fleet 
tried  to  send  relief  but  failed.  By  June,  1628,  the 
inhabitants  were  dying  at  the  rate  of  three  hundred 
a  day.  When  the  famished  people  demanded  sur- 
render, the  brave  mayor  declared  that  if  a  single 
inhabitant  be  left,  it  would  be  his  duty  to  close  the 
gates.     Finally,  when  two-thirds  of  the  people  had 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  289 

perished,  and  the  living  had  neither  strength  to  bury 
the  dead  or  to  carry  arms,  the  city  surrendered, 
October  28,  1628. 

The  fall  of  Rochelle  meant  the  fall  of  the  Re- 
formed faith  ultimately.  The  walls  of  Rochelle 
and  of  all  Huguenot  forts  were  razed  to  the  ground. 
Only  one  church  was  left  to  them  thece,  the  rest 
being  made  Catholic.  Gradually  in  many  places 
the  rights  of  the  Reformed  were  curtailed.  Their 
last  synod  was  held  at  Loudon  in  1659.  After  that 
no  synods  were  permitted.  Conversions  to  Prot- 
estantism were  forbidden.  No  church  service  was 
allowed  outside  of  the  Reformed  churches.  Sick 
Huguenots  were  not  allowed  to  be  received  into 
the  houses,  but  must  go  to  the  hospitals  to  be 
worked  upon  by  nuns  and  priests  before  they  died. 
All  this  culminated  ultimately  in  the  Revocation  of 
the  Edict  of  Nantes,  by  which  all  the  rights  which 
King  Henry  IV  gave  to  them  by  the  Edict  of 
Nantes  were  taken  away.  This  edict  forbade  the 
Reformed  religion  and  ordered  all  the  Reformed  to 
return  to  the  Catholic  Church.  Their  pastors  were 
ordered  to  leave  the  land.  Forbidden  to  worship, 
the  Huguenots  were  also  forbidden  to  flee  to  other 
lands.    They  were  thus  shut  up  with  no  escape  but 


290    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

into  the  Catholic  Church.  A  Protestant  could  now 
neither  be  born,  live  or  die  within  the  bounds  of 
France.  Many,  however,  fled,  either  by  land  or 
sea.  Some  fled  by  sea,  cooped  up  in  barrels  with 
holes  in  them,  for  breathing  or  as  stowaways  in  the 
holds  of  vessels.  Many  fled  by  land  to  Switzerland 
and  Germany. 

Meanwhile  the  awful  dragonades  began  and 
proved  wonderfully  successful  in  converting  the 
Huguenots  to  Catholicism.  The  French  army  was 
sent  among  the  Huguenots,  and  the  dragoons  were 
assigned  to  live  in  the  homes  of  the  Huguenots  and 
to  be  supported  by  them,  four  to  ten  in  each  family. 
They  were  not  to  kill  the  inmates,  but  to  do  almost 
everything  short  of  that,  so  as  to  force  them  to 
become  Catholics.  In  Beam,  they  entered  the 
houses  of  the  Reformed  with  drawn  swords  and 
gave  them  the  alternative  of  becoming  Catholics  or 
death.  They  ate  all  the  food,  broke  up  all  the  fur- 
niture and  took  or  sold  all  they  could.  They  would 
take  turns  in  keeping  the  inmates  awake,  pinch 
them,  prick  them,  etc.  The  result  was  that  many 
of  the  Bearnese  recanted  in  order  to  escape  these 
indignities.  Scarcely  a  thirtieth  of  the  Huguenot 
population  held  out.    This  success  led  to  the  same 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  291 

method  being  tried  elsewhere  as  at  Languedoc, 
Saintonge,  Viverais,  Dauphiny,  the  Cevennes  and 
Provence.  It  is  said  that  60,000  converts  were  made 
in  Bordeaux,  20,000  in  Montauban,  so  that  the 
Catholics  boasted  of  500,000  conversions  in  three 
months.  It  looked  as  if  the  Huguenots  would  be 
absolutely  wiped  out. 

But  forced  conversions  do  not  amount  to  much. 
For  those  who  became  perverts  from  Protestant- 
ism, found  that  even  after  that  act,  they  had  to  suf- 
fer many  indignities.  As  a  result  many  of  them  em- 
igrated, and  as  soon  as  they  gained  a  foreign  land, 
they  confessed  their  sin  in  joining  the  Catholics  and 
again  connected  themselves  with  the  Huguenots. 
And  while  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes 
seemed  to  be  the  death-blow  to  the  Huguenots,  yet 
that  date  was  one  of  the  most  unlucky  days  of 
France.  For  it  deprived  the  King  of  France  of  all 
his  Protestant  allies,  whom  he  greatly  needed  to 
offset  the  growing  power  of  Austria  and  Spain. 
Besides  in  spite  of  his  prohibition,  the  emigration 
out  of  France  began  assuming  enormous  propor- 
tions. By  the  edict  France  had  lost  500,000  in- 
habitants and  100  millions  in  money,  9,000  sailors, 
L2,ooo  soldiers   (many  of  them  her  bravest),  600 


292    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

officers  and  her  most  flourishing  manufactures. 
Many  branches  of  trade  were  ruined  and  many 
parts  of  the  kingdom  became  depopulated.  From 
that  day  the  fortunes  of  Louis  XIV  declined.  De- 
feat after  defeat  came  until  he  finally  had  to  sue 
for  peace.  While  all  this  strength  and  wealth, 
which  he  lost,  went  to  build  up  his  rival  nations,  as 
Germany,  Holland  and  England,  which  were  Prot- 
estant. 

After  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  the 
French  Reformed  church  came  into  greatest  ex- 
tremity, so  that  she  was  called  "the  Church  of  the 
Desert."  She  had  no  pastors,  for  they  had  been 
ordered  out  of  the  land  and  a  reward  of  5,500 
livres  was  promised  to  any  one  who  would  capture 
a  pastor  or  cause  him  to  be  taken.  And  yet  they 
had  pastors  who  risked  their  lives  to  feed  the 
flock.  In  spite  of  the  edict,  the  Huguenots  would 
meet  for  worship  with  or  without  pastors.  They 
would  meet  in  woods  or  groves  or  caves  or  quarries. 
Often  they  would  be  surprised  by  French  soldiers, 
who  shot  into  the  assembly,  killing  and  wounding 
or  hanging  them  on  neighboring  trees,  or  taking 
them  to  prison,  to  die  or  to  be  sent  to  the  galleys 
as  slaves-     We  may  perhaps  take  time  to  give  an 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  293 

illustration  of  this.  When  young  Rey,  one  of  the 
first  pastors  to  become  a  martyr,  after  being  cap- 
tured, was  informed  that  his  punishment  was  death, 
he  replied,  "My  life  is  not  of  value  to  me,  pro- 
vided I  gain  Christ."  When  put  to  torture,  he  said, 
"I  am  treated  more  mildly  than  my  Saviour."  It 
was  supposed  that  such  martyrdom  would  stop  the 
Huguenot  worship,  but  they  seemed  to  have  the  op- 
posite effect.  The  Huguenots  held  services  in  many 
districts,  especially  in  southeastern  France.  From 
1686-98,  seventeen  pastors  were  martyred,  three  at 
Nismes,  ten  at  St.  Hyppolite  in  the  Cevennes,  and 
12  at  the  Peyrou  at  Montpelier,  where  most  of 
the  Protestants  were  executed. 

In  the  history  of  the  Church  of  the  Desert,  three 
men  stand  out  prominently  in  saving  the  Huguenot 
faith.  The  first  of  these  Huguenot  preachers  was 
Claude  Brousson.  He  was  at  first  a  lawyer  at 
Nismes  in  southeastern  France.  In  the  courts,  he 
had  been  an  able  defender  of  the  rights  of  the 
Huguenots.  When  the  dragonades  began,  he 'was 
forced  to  leave  France  and  he  began  the  practice 
of  law  at  Lausanne  in  Switzerland.  But  his  heart 
was  in  France.  He  urged  that  ministers  be  sent  to 
France   and   finally  he   went  himself,  taking  with 


294    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

him  a  number  of  Huguenots,  who  promised  to  aid 
him.  He  secretly  gathered  them  together.  They 
called  him  to  be  their  pastor  and  he  was  ordained. 
As  he  went  about  among  the  congregations,  he  was 
continually  tracked  by  Jesuit  spies.  He  was  hunted 
from  one  place  to  another  by  the  dragoons.  One 
by  one  his  companions  were  captured  and  put  to 
death.  A  large  price  was  set  on  his  head.  But 
in  spite  of  all  this,  he  preached  in  Languedoc  and 
in  the  Cevennes.  He  dared  even  preach  in  Nismes, 
his  old  home.  Any  of  the  Protestants  could  have 
gotten  5,000  livres  for  his  betrayal,  but  they  proved 
true.  Once  while  preaching  in  a  garden,  the  sol- 
diers ambushed  them.  Forty  were  taken  prisoners 
and  sent  to  the  galleys  and  the  women  to  the  Tower 
of  Constance.  But  he  escaped  although  the  sol- 
diers were  at  his  very  heels.  He  then  preached 
at  Sommieres,  eight  miles  west  of  Nismes,  where 
the  soldiers  arrived  just  too  late.  Often  in  his 
wanderings  he  almost  perished  for  want  of  food, 
and  was  often  nearly  ready  to  die  for  want  of  rest, 
yet  his  constant  thought  was  of  the  people  commit- 
ted to  him.  To  write  out  his  sermons,  he  carried 
a  small  board  which  he  called  his  "wilderness 
table."    This  he  placed  on  his  knees  and  he  wrote 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  295 

his  sermons  in  the  woods  and  caves.  He  published 
some  of  them  (1595)  and  sent  them  to  King  Louis 
XIV,  to  show  that  he  preached  only  the  pure  Word 
of  God. 

Finally  with  health  broken  by  his  constant  labors 
and  dangers,  he  returned  to  Lausanne  in  1693,  a 
physical  wreck,  after  his  labors  of  more  than  four 
years.  He  was  so  changed,  that  even  his  wife  did 
not  recognize  him.  He  remained  fifteen  months  in 
Switzerland  and  then  travelled  through  Protestant 
countries,  pleading  the  cause  of  the  Huguenots. 
He  was  called  as  pastor  of  the  Walloon  church  at 
the  Hague  in  Holland.  It  was  an  easy  place,  but 
he  was  not  at  ease.  His  heart  was  in  France  with 
the  abandoned  Huguenots  of  the  desert.  So  after 
a  four-months  pastorate,  he  resigned  and  went 
back  to  France  to  preach.  On  August,  1695,  he 
re-entered  France  near  Sedan,  held  a  meeting  there 
and  was  almost  captured.  He  visited  many  places, 
as  Picardy,  Normandy,  Burgundy,  even  the  neigh- 
borhood of  Paris  and  by  the  end  of  the  year  he  re- 
turned to  Switzerland.  But  in  August,  1697,  he 
again  entered  France  for  a  third  and  last  time.  He 
went  through  the  high-Alps,  Dauphiny,  Languedoc 
and   Orange.     By   August,    1698,   he   had   entered 


296    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Nismes,  though  a  large  reward  of  600  louis  d'or, 
was  offered  for  him.  Once  he  hid  himself  in  a  well 
and  the  soldiers  were  lowered  into  it,  but  did  not 
find  him.  Finally  at  Oloron  he  fell  into  the  hands 
of  a  spy  and  was  arrested  and  sent  to  Montpelier, 
where  on  the  Peyrou  he  was  executed  November  4, 
1698,  in  the  presence  of  20,000  people.  He  tried 
to  speak  from  the  scaffold,  but  his  voice  was 
drowned  by  drums. 

The  workers  die,  but  God's  work  goes  on.  The 
successor  of  Brousson  was  Antoine  Court,  who  was 
not  merely  a  preacher  like  Brousson,  but  became 
the  organizer  of  the  church  and  thus  its  savior 
in  the  midst  of  persecution.  He  was  born  at  Vil- 
leneuve  de  Berg  in  Viverais  in  1696.  As  a  boy,  he 
was  compelled  to  go  to  the  Jesuit  school,  but  he 
hated  the  mass.  One  day  when  his  mother  set  out 
to  attend  a  secret  Huguenot  service,  she  found  him 
following  her.  She  urged  him  to  return,  but  he 
begged  to  be  allowed  to  go  with  her.  She  shed 
tears  at  his  words  but  granted  his  request.  At  that 
time  he  was  too  little  and  too  weak  to  walk  all 
the  way  to  the  meeting,  so  others  took  him  on  their 
shoulders  and  carried  him.  He  thus  early  showed 
that  he  was  a  born  Huguenot  in  spirit.    At  the  age 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  297 

of  seventeen  he  began  to  read  the  Bible  to  the  secret 
assemblies  and  then  began  to  preach.  His  mother 
was  greatly  troubled  at  his  desire  to  become  a 
preacher.  He  replied  "whoso  loves  father  and 
mother  more  than  me  is  not  worthy  of  me."  He 
went  to  Nismes  and  even  to  Marseilles,  where 
among  the  galleys  he  organized  a  system  of  secret 
worship  by  the  Huguenots.  Then  he  preached  at 
Nismes  and  in  the  Cevennes  and  Viverais  districts. 
By  this  time,  the  synods  and  the  consistories  of 
the  church  had  all  become  forgotten  owing  to  the 
persecutions, — the  church  had  become  disintegra- 
ted. But  in  an  abandoned  quarry  near  Nismes  on 
the  very  month  when  King  Louis  XIV  breathed 
his  last,  he  organized  the  first  synod  of  the  desert, 
August  21,  1715.  It  consisted  of  three  laymen  and 
about  six  ministers.  He,  after  preaching  to  many 
assemblies,  often  in  the  greatest  danger,  was  or- 
dained November  21,  1718.  He  greatly  desired  to 
get  ministers  for  the  church  and  thus  began  the 
training  of  young  men.  "I  have  often  pitched  my 
professor's  chair,"  he  says,  "underneath  a  rock. 
The  sky  was  our  roof  and  the  leafy  branches 
thrown  out  from  the  crevices  of  the  rock  was  our 
canopy.     There  I  and  my  students  would  remain 


298    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

for  eight  days."  There  he  trained  them  in  the 
Bible  and  in  the  preparation  of  sermons.  And 
when  they  preached  before  him,  it  would  be  from 
a  rock.  This  was  a  sort  of  wandering  theological 
seminary,  the  students  following  him  from  place 
to  place. 

But  though  many  young  men  sought  the  danger- 
ous occupation  of  the  ministry,  yet  there  were  not 
preachers  enough.  For  as  the  persecutions  would 
sometimes  have  a  lull  at  different  places,  the  num- 
ber of  the  Huguenots  began  increasing  again.  So 
finally  Court  went  to  Switzerland  and  there  found- 
ed (1726)  a  theological  seminary  at  Lausanne. 
Court  returned  to  France  after  having  founded  the 
seminary.  Many  were  his  hair-breadth  escapes. 
Once  near  Nismes,  while  seated  under  a  tree,  com- 
posing a  sermon,  the  soldiers  came  in  sight.  He 
climbed  up  into  the  tree  and  concealed  by  the 
branches  escaped.  Once  the  house  in  which  he  was 
staying  was  surrounded  by  soldiers.  He  made  his 
friend,  the  owner  of  the  house,  go  to  bed  as  if  sick 
and  he  hid  between  the  bed  and  the  wall  and  es- 
caped their  search. 

But  in  1729  he  left  France  to  spend  the  rest  of 
his  life  at  Lausanne,  having  by  that  time  organized 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  299 

112  churches  and  in  the  district  of  Langusdoc,  there 
were  now  200,000  Huguenots.  In  1742,  when  the 
French  soldiers  were  called  away  by  war,  the  Hu- 
guenots increased  rapidly.  The  congregations  often 
called  Court  to  come  back,  and  when  he  did  not, 
he  was  even  charged  by  some  with  cowardice,  as 
if  he  had  lost  his  old  Huguenot  courage  to  face 
persecutions,  But  Court  seems  to  have  felt  he  was 
doing  a  greater  work  by  educating  the  young  men 
at  Lausanne  than  by  preaching  himself.  In  1744 
he  again  visited  France,  preaching  almost  daily  to 
immense  audiences.  At  Nismes,  he  preached  in 
the  old  quarry,  about  three  miles  from  the  town 
to  an  audience  of  20,000.  But  when  the  war  was 
over  and  the  French  troops  returned,  then  severe 
persecution  began  again.  In  spite  of  it,  the  Re- 
formed increased  in  numbers.  In  1756  there  were 
48  pastors  and  22  probationers  and  students ;  in 
1763,  62  pastors,  35  preachers  and  15  students  at 
work.     Court  died  at  Lausanne,  1760. 

But  when  one  worker  dies,  there  is  another  to 
take  his  place.  Court  had  passed  away,  but  then 
came  Paul  Rabout,  the  most  prominent  of  the  grad- 
uates of  Court's  theological  seminary,  at  Lausanne, 
and  the  greatest  preacher  of  the  "Church  of  the 


300    Famous  Places  of  Re  formed  Churches. 

Desert"  in  his  day.  He  was  born  January  9,  1718, 
near  Montpelier.  At  the  age  of  sixteen,  he  became 
the  companion  of  the  pastors  in  their  labors  and 
dangers.  In  1740  he  went  to  Lausanne  to  study 
under  Court,  where  Court  early  recognized  his 
ability.  He  returned,  1743,  as  pastor  at  Nismes, 
and  at  once  became  the  leader  of  the  church.  His 
study,  which  was  often  a  hut  of  stones  in  the  re- 
cesses of  a  wood,  became  the  centre  of  the  Hugue- 
not Church.  For  more  than  thirty  years,  his  only 
dwelling  places  were  caves,  huts  and  out-buildings. 
He  was  not  only  an  eloquent  preacher  but  a  wise 
organizer.  His  moderation  won  the  respect  even 
of  many  Catholics.  On  one  occasion  the  door  of 
the  house,  in  which  a  meeting  was  held,  was  sud- 
denly thrown  open,  and  a  muffled  man  threw  open 
his  cape,  revealing  the  military  commander  of  the 
town,  who  said,  "My  friends,  you  have  Paul  Ra- 
baut.    In  a  quarter  of  an  hour  I  shall  be  here  with 

soldiers,  accompanied  by  father  ,  who  has 

lodged  information  against  you."  Rabaut,  of 
course,  left  and  when  the  soldiers  came,  he  was  not 
to  be  found.  Many  were  his  disguises — as  a  baker, 
a  trader,  a  laborer.  Once  when  changing  horses 
at  a  post-house  between  Nismes  and  Montpelier, 


Prance  and  the  Huguenots.  301 

the  French  minister  of  war  happened  to  be  there. 
And  Rabaut  dared  to  introduce  himself  by  name 
and  present  a  petition.  The  marquis  might  have 
arrested  and  hanged  him  on  the  spot.  But  impress- 
ed by  Rabaut's  noble  bearing,  he  accepted  the  pe- 
tition and  promised  to  lay  it  before  the  king.  Ra- 
baut's enthusiasm  is  shown  by  the  following  ex- 
tract of  a  letter  to  a  friend  at  Geneva:  "When  I 
fix  my  attention  upon  the  divine  fire,  with  which 
I  will  not  say  Jesus  and  the  Apostles,  but  the  Re- 
formed and  their  immediate  successes,  burned  for 
the  salvation  of  souls,  it  seems  to  me  that  in  com- 
parison with  them,  we  are  ice.  Their  immense 
works  astound  me  and  at  the  same  time  cover  me 
with  confusion.  What  could  I  give  to  resemble 
them  in  everything  laudable."  Such  modesty  only 
reveals  his  greatness.  Court  was  the  reorganizer 
of  the  Huguenot  Church.  Rabaut  made  his  or- 
ganization permanent.  It  is  a  very  remarkable  fact, 
that  one  of  the  many  revenges  in  French  religious 
history,  was  that  when  religious  liberty  was  first 
ordered  in  1789  by  the  National  Assembly  of 
France  in  the  time  of  the  French  Revolution,  it  be- 
came the  duty  of  the  president  of  that  body  to  an- 
nounce it.     The  president  happened  to  be  no  less 


302    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

a    person    than    the    son    of    Rabaut,    Rabaut    St. 
Etienne. 

3.  The  Condition  of  the  Huguenots  after  the  Edict 
of  Toleration. 

In  1783  King  Louis  XVI  issued  an  Edict  of  Tol- 
eration, but  it  was  not  effective.  Napoleon  Bona- 
parte granted  the  church  an  organization.  But 
alas,  by  that  time  the  church  had  become  honey- 
combed with  rationalism.  As  one  writer  says : 
"The  Word  of  God  began  with  a  small  letter  and 
Napoleon  with  a  large  letter,  and  when  in  a  ser- 
mon the  Messiah  was  preached,  it  was  on  Corsica 
that  their  minds  rested  and  not  at  Bethlehem." 
Voltaire  with  his  infidelity  had  injured  the  church 
more  than  the  persecutions.  Still  the  church  woke 
to  life.  In  1807  there  were  78  Reformed  temples- 
Then  came  the  revival  in  France  after  the  revival 
at  Geneva  under  Haldane,  when  Pyt  and  the 
Monods  became  the  leaders  of  the  French  Church. 
The  Evangelization  Society  of  France  was  founded 
in  1833,  whose  aim  was  to  evangelize  France.  This 
was  followed  in  1847  by  the  Central  Society  of 
Protestant  Evangelization.  The  church  was  wak- 
ing up.  These  societies  have  now  grown  to  large 
size  and  great  influence. 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  303 

In  187 1  occurred  a  most  momentous  event — 
France  became  a  republic.  This  was  very  signifi- 
cant. France  had  cast  out  Calvanism  by  the  Edict 
of  Nantes.  But  now  she  takes  refuge  in  political 
Calvinism,  for  was  not  Calvinism  the  founder  of 
republics?  So  Calvin,  although  he  was  driven  out 
of  France,  was  ultimately  the  victor  politically. 
And  what  was  most  significant,  the  prime  minister 
of  the  French  republic  was  a  Calvinist,  Guizot. 
Without  doubt  he  was  one  of  the  greatest  states- 
men France  has  produced.  He  was  also  a  histor- 
ian and  the  main-stay  of  the  Reformed  church  in 
France.  He  reformed  the  educational  system  of 
France  from  top  to  bottom.  He  died  1874.  Not- 
withstanding the  number  of  Huguenots  in  France 
has  been  small,  yet  the  number  of  prominent  men 
in  public  office  is  all  out  of  proportion  to  the  small- 
ness  of  their  numbers.  The  National  Church  of 
France,  the  Huguenot  Church,  held  its  first  synod 
since  the  revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes  in 
1872.  It,  however,  split  into  two  parties,  the  ortho- 
dox, which  desired  to  be  true  to  the  old  Gallic 
confession  and  the  rationalistic  or  liberal  As  no 
succeeding  national  synod  was  held  the  orthodox 
party  organized  itself  into  an  unofficial  synod  in 
1879.     This  synod  has  met  regularly  and  by  its 


304    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

fine  organization  and  aggressive  spirit  has  grown 
more  rapidly  than  the  liberals.  The  Free  Reform- 
ed Church  was  organized  1849,  when  Frederic 
Monod  seceded. 

In  1905  France  voted  to  disestablish  the  church. 
Though  this  was  aimed  at  the  Catholic  Church, 
yet  by  it  the  Huguenot  Church  wag  also  separated 
from  the  state.  It  was  feared  she  might  have  to 
pass  through  a  severe  financial  crisis  in  doing  so. 
But  that  noble  church,  which  has  so  nobly  sur- 
mounted so  many  crises,  has  surmounted  this  one 
within  a  few  years.  It  has,  however,  revealed  a 
peculiar  condition  of  affairs  in  France.  Where 
there  used  to  be  thirty  millions  of  Catholics  there 
are  now,  on  the  authority  of  Prof.  Sabatier,  only 
four  or  five  millions  who  go  to  mass  once  a  year — 
a  drop  of  twenty-five  millions.  No  such  exodus 
out  of  the  Catholic  Church  has  occurred  since  the 
reformation.  The  most  of  the  French  people  seem 
to  be  infidels  or  indifferent  to  religion.  At  present 
the  Catholic  church  in  France  is  bitterly  attack- 
ing the  public  schools  as  godless  and  thus  widening 
the  breach  between  Rome  and  France,  once  the 
most  faithful  daughter  of  the  papacy.  France  is 
peculiarly  ripe  for  Gospel  work,  since  so  many  are 
unbelievers,  for  she  is  passing  through  a  great  cri- 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  305 

sis  in  infidelity.  There  are  in  France  between  600,- 
000  and  700,000  Protestants,  most  of  whom  belong 
to  the  Huguenot  Church.  The  Free  Reformed 
Church  also  reports  4,000  communicants.  Had 
there  been  no  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Nantes 
and  had  the  Hugenots  been  permitted  to  remain  in 
France,  there  would  have  been,  by  natural  issue 
alone,  five  to  six  millions  of  Huguenots,  to  say 
nothing  of  the  increase  by  conversions  from  Rome. 
Had  Napoleon  had  such  brave  true  soldiers  as  the 
Huguenots,  he  would  have  conquered  all  Europe 
and  France  would  be  the  leading  nation  of  the  con- 
tinent of  Europe. 

From  this  brief  review  of  the  history  of  the  Hu- 
guenots it  is  evident  there  are  still  many  places  very 
sacred  in  Huguenot  history  in  France,  outside  of 
Paris.  Probably  Rochelle  is  the  most  important,  in 
whose  public  square  can  still  be  seen  the  marks  of 
the  ruin  of  the  Reformed  church  raised  by  the 
French  king.  Southwestern  France  has  many  sa- 
cred places  in  Beam  and  Navarre,  as  Pau  and 
Montauban,  the  seat  of  the  Reformed  theological 
seminary.  Southern  France  is  especially  rich  in 
these  Huguenot  shrines.  At  Montpelier  is  the  Pey- 
rou,  where  hundreds  of  Huguenots  sealed  their 
faith  with  their  blood  as  did  Brousson.     It  is  a 


306    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

broad  platform,  elevated  high  above  the  rest  of  the 
town  and  commanding  extensive  views.  It  is  now 
a  famous  promenade,  laid  out  in  terraced  walks 
and  shady  groves  with  gay  parterres  of  flowers,  the 
famous  promenade  of  the  town  and  one  of  the  finest 
in  Europe.  Nismes  has  a  quarry  three  miles  away 
from  it,  whose  stones  are  red  with  Huguenot  blood. 
It  is  called  the  "Echo,"  and  was  once  a  Roman  ex- 
cavation. Around  its  craggy  sides  the  Huguenot 
congregation  would  range  themselves  while  the 
pulpit  was  in  the  narrow  pass  leading  to  the  quarry. 
Two  miles  from  Nismes  is  the  bed  of  a  mountain 
torrent,  which  was  used  for  services.  The  worship- 
pers ranged  themselves  on  the  slopes  of  the  grassy 
valley,  the  pastor  preaching  from  the  grassy  level 
in  the  hollow,  while  sentinels  were  posted  on  ad- 
joining heights,  who  could  give  warning  if  neces- 
sary. Even  after  the  days  of  the  persecutions,  the 
Protestants  of  Nismes  still  frequented  these  meet- 
ing-places ;  sometimes  in  audiences  of  5-6000,  and 
at  the  celebration  of  the  Lord's  Supper  double  that 
number.  Before  the  Hotel  de  Ville  at  Nismes, 
there  occurred  a  great  burning  of  Protestant  books. 
The  whole  region  of  the  Cevennes,  Languedoc  and 
Dauphiny  is  full  of  memories  of  the  Huguenots. 


France  and  the  Huguenots.  307 

Marseilles  and  Toulon,  in  the  south,  with  Dunkirk 
in  the  north,  were  the  places  where  the  Huguenots 
rowed  and  died  as  galley-slaves.  Perhaps  one  of 
the  most  interesting  of  these  places  is  the  Tower  of 
Constance,  located  on  the  shores  of  the  Mediter- 
ranean at  Aiguesmortes,  in  the  province  of  Guard. 
It  is  a  tower  sixty-six  feet  in  diameter  and  ninety 
feet  high,  surmounted  by  a  light-house  turret  thirty- 
four  feet  high.  It  contains  two  chambers.  Here 
the  Huguenot  women  were  imprisoned.  It  was 
terribly  unhealthy.  In  1686  sixteen  of  them  died 
in  five  months.  Isabeau  Menet  was  imprisoned 
there  fifteen  years  and  lost  her  reason.  Marie  Du- 
rand  was  put  there  at  the  age  of  fifteen  and  im- 
prisoned till  fifty-three.  One  of  the  woman  had 
her  foot  partly  eaten  by  a  rat.  Their  sufferings 
were  very  great. 

Flung  to  the  heedless  winds, 

Or  on  the  waters  cast, 
The   martyr's   ashes,   watched, 

Shall  gathered  be  at  last: 
And  from  that  scattered  dust, 

Around  us  and  abroad, 
Shall  spring  a  plenteous  seed 

Of  witnesses  for  God. 


308     famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

The  Father  hath  received 

Their   latest   living  breath: 
And  vain  is  Satan  boast 

Of  victory  in   their  death: 
Still,  still,  though  dead,  they  speak, 

And,  trumpet-tongued,  proclaim 
To  many  a  waking  land 

The  one  availing  Name. 

— Luther,  translated  by  Fox. 


THE   BALSILLE   IN   THE   ITALIAN  VALLEYS 


Chapter  III.— ITALY  AND  THE  WAL- 
DENSES. 

THE  Waldenses—  the  Israel  of  the  Alps,— 
the  Protestants  before  the  reformation, — 
this  is  an  exceedingly  interesting  history 
to  every  Protestant.  They  are  the  connecting  link 
between  the  early  Christian  Church  of  the  New 
Testament  and  modern  Protestantism,  doctrinally, 
if  not  historically,  as  was  believed  some  years  ago. 
They  were  Reformed  before  the  Reformation.  Re- 
formed because  they  tried  to  reform  the  Catholic 
Church  of  its  abuses.  And  they  formally  united 
with  the  Reformed  in  the  reformation  through  the 
efforts  Of  William  Farel  the  reformer.  We  can 
join  with  them  in  their  song: 

For  the  strength   of  the  hills  we  bless  thee,  our   God, 

our  Father's  God. 
Thou  hast  made  thy  children  mighty,  by  the  touch  of 

the   mountains   sod; 
Thou  hast  fixed  our  ark  of  refuge,  where   the  spoilers 

feet  ne'er  trod; 
For  the  strength  of  the  hills  we  bless  thee,  our   God, 

our  Father's  God. 

311 


312     Fatuous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

For  the  stern   denies  of  battle,  bearing  record  of  our 

dead; 
For   the   shadow   of  thy  presence   round   our  camp   of 

rock  outspread. 
We  are  watchers  of  the  beacon,  whose  light  must  never 

die; 
We  are  guardians  of  an  altar,  midst  the  silence  of  the 

sky. 
The  rocks  yield  founts  of  courage,  struck  forth  as  by 

the  rod, 
For  the  strength  of  the  hills,  we  bless  thee,  our  God, 

our  Father's  God. 

For  the  snows  and  for  the  torrents,  for  the  free  heart's 

burial  sod; 
For  the  strength  of  the  hills  we  bless  thee,  our  God, 

our  Father's  God.  — Hemans. 


The  Waklensians  were  the  followers  of  Peter 
Waldo,  a  wealthy  merchant  of  Lyons,  France,  about 
1 1 50  A.  D.  Suddenly,  when  one  of  his  friends  fell 
dead  at  his  side,  he  was  stricken  by  the  thought, 
"What  would  have  become  of  me,  if  death  had 
stricken  me  that  moment."  On  another  occasion  he 
heard  a  ballad  singer,  surrounded  by  a  crowd  in  a 
public  square,  reciting  the  story  of  St.  Alexis,  who 
left  his  wealth  and  his  bride  and  took  the  vow  of 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  313 

poverty.     Deeply  impressed  he  took  the  singer  to 
his  own  home.    During  the  night  his  soul  was  trou- 
bled.   The  next  morning  he  went  to  a  learned  the- 
ologian for  advice.     This  theologian  had  as  many 
roads  to  heaven  as  Waldo  had  to  the  different  mar- 
kets.    He  spoke  very  learnedly,   so  much  so  that 
Waldo,  who  longed  for  the  simple  Gospel,  finally 
cut  matters  short  by  asking,  "Of  all  the  roads  that 
lead  to  heaven,  which  is  the  surest.     I  desire  the 
perfect  way."     "Ah !"  the  theologian  replied,  "here 
is  the  precept  of  Christ,  If  thou  wilt  be  perfect,  sell 
all  that  thou  hast  and  give  to  the  poor  and  thou 
shalt  have  treasure  in  heaven  and  come,-  take  up  thy 
cross    and    follow    me."      This   answer   settled    his 
mind.     He  would  give  up  all  his  property  to  the 
poor.     His  friends  thought  him  mad,  but  he  did  it. 
Then  seeing  that  there  were  so  many,  who,  like  him- 
self, were  longing  for  the  simple  Gospel,  he  began 
reading  the  Bible  to  the  people.     Unable  to  under- 
stand Latin  in  which  the  Bible  was  then  printed, 
his  heart  was  greatly  fed  by  a  translation  into  his 
own  tongue  (the  French)  which  was  so  comforting 
to   him   that   he  began   reading  it  to   others.     He 
found  it  was  very  gladly  received  and  so  he  trained 
others  to  read  the  Bible  to  the  people. 


314    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

This  was  the  beginning  of  the  Waldensian 
church.  But  opposition  began.  The  Catholic 
Church  would  permit  a  man  to  give  his  money  to 
the  poor.  But  that  he  should  read  the  Word  of 
God  (which  was  the  property  of  the  church  and  the 
priests),  to  the  people,  seemed  to  them  a  sacrilege — 
"a  casting  of  pearls  before  swine" — So  he  was  for- 
bidden to  do  it.  But  Waldo  felt  he  was  not  doing 
anything  wrong.  He  was  not  teaching  or  preaching 
to  the  people,  only  "talking"  to  them.  Preaching 
belonged  to  the  priests  but  certainly  it  was  not 
wrong  to  only  talk.  When  he  found  it  forbidden, 
he  believed  in  his  simple-heartedness  that  the  pope 
would  take  his  side  and  permit  it.  So  to  the  pope 
he  went.  Ah !  he  did  not  know  the  popes.  He 
pled  with  the  pope  for  permission  simply  to  read 
the  Bible  to  the  people.  The  decision  was  that  the 
Waldenses  could  do  this,  but  only  with  the  permis- 
sion of  the  clergy.  That  generally  meant  a  refusal, 
as  the  bishops  were  usually  opposed  to  this  new 
method  of  evangelization.  Waldo  returned  to 
Lyons.  But  in  his  soul  was  now  born  a  reformer. 
"We  must  obey  God  rather  than  men,"  he  said,  "for 
God  commands  us  to  preach  the  Gospel  to  every 
creature."     The  movement  spread  rapidly  among 


Italy  and  the  JValdenses.  315 

the  people,  who  heard  the  Gospel  gladly.  The 
bishop  of  Lyons  forbade  all  such  preaching.  Eight 
thousand  went  into  exile  for  his  doctrines.  But 
where  should  they  go  that  they  might  have  liberty 
to  do  as  they  desired?  The  truth  was  they  went 
everywhere.  Persecution,  instead  of  suppressing 
the  movement,  only  scattered  it ;  for  it  spread  into 
Italy,  Switzerland,  Bohemia  and  Germany,  where 
Waldensian  colonies  were  formed,  and  before  the 
reformation,  they  had  done  a  great  work  in  leaven- 
ing society  with  Evangelical  truth.  When  Luther 
published  his  translation  of  the  Bible,  there  had 
already  been  published  nineteen  German  editions 
of  the  Bible.  Of  these  one  of  the  most  important 
was  the  Waldensian,  the  Codex  Teplensis,  so  called 
because  discovered  at  Tepel  in  Bohemia.  But  the 
Waldenses  found  their  home  mainly  in  the 
southern  high  Alps,  having  crossed  from  Dauphiny 
in  France  over  the  high  Alps  to  the  northwestern 
valleys  in  Italy.  There  they  located  themselves  in 
several  valley>  running  west  and  northwest  from 
the  town  of  La  Tour  (their  capital),  not  very  far 
from  Turin.  The  northern  valley  is  the  valley  of 
the  Perouse,  the  southern  the  valley  of  Lucerna, 
each  with  branch  valleys.    In  persecution  they  gen- 


316    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

erally  fled  to  the  northern  valley,  because  it  had 
the  almost  impregnable  citadels  of  Pra  del  Tor  and 
the  Balsille.  Persecution  after  persecution  raged 
over  them.  When  Italy  persecuted  them  they  would 
flee  to  the  high  Alps  or  over  the  Alps  to  France. 
When  France  persecuted  them  they  would  flee  to 
Italy.  In  i486  came  their  first  great  persecution,  as 
the  pope  tried  to  exterminate  them  by  sending 
18,000  troops  into  their  valleys.  But  they  defend- 
ed themselves  so  bravely  that  their  enemies  were 
defeated  and  in  disgust  withdrew.  But  a  Walden- 
sian  colony,  which  had  been  formed  in  the  province 
of  Calabria  in  southern  Italy,  about  1500  A.  D. 
was  terribly  persecuted  by  the  Catholic  Church, 
which  introduced  the  Inquisition  and  crushed  it 
out  in  the  latter  part  of  the  sixteenth  century. 

When  the  reformation  broke  out  the  Waldenses 
early  came  into  contact  with  it.  Farel,  that  mis- 
sionary reformer,  visited  them  in  1532  accompan- 
ied by  Saunier  and  prevailed  upon  them  to  official- 
ly join  the  Reformed.  This  alliance  with  the  Re- 
formed stood  them  in  good  stead  later,  as  we  shall 
see. 

As  the  first  great  persecution  had  been  in  i486, 
the   second   great   persecution   was   in    1560.      The 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  317 

Waldenses  fled  up  their  valley  to  Pra  del  Tor,  their 
stronghold.*  The  Catholic  prince  marched  up  the 
valley  to  Rochemalan.  The  enemy  encamped  for 
the  night  expecting  to  attack  the  Waldenses  the  next 
morning.  But  during  the  night  a  Waldensian  boy 
got  hold  of  a  drum  and  began  beating  it  in  a  ravine 
near  by.  The  soldiers  thought  a  hostile  army  was 
approaching.  The  Waldenses,  seeing  this  and 
thinking  an  attack  was  to  be  made  on  them,  rushed 
forward  to  repel  it,  and  so  surprised  their  enemies, 
that  most  of  them  threw  down  their  arms  and  fled. 
When  the  Catholic  general,  irritated  at  this  dis- 
graceful retreat  of  1,200  soldiers  before  200  peas- 
ants, advanced  a  second  time,  they  were  defeated 
by  the  little  band  of  heroes,  who  charged  his  troops 
with  "Viva  Jesu  Christo,"  and  drove  them  in  confu- 
sion down  the  valley.  The  Catholic  general  again 
attacked  them  from  three  sides,  expecting  to  gain 
a  victory.  But  the  three  bodies  of  his  soldiers 
were  driven  back  in  succession.     He  then  beseiged 


*This  was  a  little  amphitheatre  surrounded  by  rug- 
ged and  almost  inaccessible  mountains  at  the  head  of 
the  valley  of  Angrogna.  In  it  in  the  last  century  the 
Waldenses  had  their  college  for  the  education  of  their 
ministers. 


318    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

them  for  four  days  and  on  the  fifth  his  soldiers  re- 
fused to  obey  his  orders  to  attack.  The  count  is 
said  to  have  wept  as  he  sat  on  a  rock  and  looked  at 
so  many  of  his  dead,  the  soldiers  themselves  ex- 
claiming, "God  fights  for  these  people  and  we  do 
them  wrong." 

Another  century  passed  away  and  on  Easter, 
1655,  came  the  third  great  persecution — an  awful 
massacre  in  the  Waldensian  valleys,  that  sent  a 
thrill  of  horror  through  Europe  and  brought  Crom- 
well to  their  relief.  On  Palm  Sunday,  1655,  the 
army  of  Savoy  suddenly  advanced  to  La  Tour  and 
for  a  week  committed  the  most  terrible  brutalities. 
Not  a  cottage  was  left  standing  and  those  who  were 
not  able  to  flee  to  the  upper  valleys  were  put  to  the 
sword.  On  June  15,  1655,  four  different  bodies  of 
troops  attacked  Angrogna  where  the  Waldensian 
army  of  three  hundred  had  assembled,  led  by  the 
heroic  Janevel.  He  fought  them  for  four  hours, 
and  then,  seeing  signs  of  impatience  and  hesitancy 
in  their  ranks,  he  gave  the  command,  "Forward, 
my  friends,"  and  rushed  down  hill  like  an  ava- 
lanche, the  three  hundred  driving  the  3,000  before 
them.  Cromwell  now  came  forward  as  their  pro- 
tector.   He  offered  them  an  asylum  in  Ireland,  but 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  319 

it  was  too  far  away.  The  Waldenses,  however, 
asked  him  to  aid  them  in  some  other  way.  So  he 
addressed  letters  of  intercession,  through  his  Sec- 
retary, John  Milton,  to  the  leading  European  pow- 
ers, asking  them  to  join  with  him  in  stopping  these 
barbarities.  Milton  himself  wrote  his  noble  sonnet 
on  them: 

Avenge,  O  Lord,  thy  slaughtered  saints,  whose   bones 
Lie   scattered  on  the   Alpine  mountains   cold. 
F.v'n  them,  who  kept  thy  truth,  so  pure  of  old; 
When  all  our  fathers  worshipped  stocks  and  stones, 
Forget  not  in  thy  book:  record  their  groans 
Who  were   thy  she'ep,   and   in   their  ancient  folds, 
Slain   by   the  bloody   Piedmontcse,   that   roll'd 
Mother  with  infant  down  the  rocks.    Their  moan 
The  vales  redoubled  to  the  hills  and  they 
To  heaven.    Their  martyred  blood  and  ashes  sow 
O'er  all  the  Italian  fields,  where  still  doth  sway 
The  triple  Tyrant:   that  from  these  may  grow 
A  hundred  fold,  who  having  learn'd  thy  way 
Early  may  fly  the  Babylonian  woe. 

Cromwell  sent  them  $10,000  out  of  his  own 
purse.  He  also  appointed  a  day  of  prayer  for  them, 
together  with  a  general  collection  all  over  England, 


t,2o    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

by  which  $190,000  was  raised  for  them.*  He  sent 
an  ambassador  to  the  Duke  of  Savoy  to  expostulate 
with  him.  And  as  a  treaty  was  about  being  made 
between  England  and  France,  he  refused  to  sign 
it,  until  Cardinal  Mazzarin  of  France,  had  under- 
taken to  bring  pressure  on  the  Duke  of  Savoy,  to 
stop  the  persecutions  of  the  Waldenses.  So  the 
Waldenses  were  permitted  to  return  to  their  val- 
leys. This  permission  was  observed  as  long  as 
Cromwell  lived,  and  for  about  thirty  years  they  en- 
joyed peace,  rebuilding  their  villages  and  cultivat- 
ing their  vineyards. 

But  after  Cromwell's  death,  they  no  longer  had 
a  protector  and  persecutions  again  began.  This  it 
seems  was  brought  about  by  King  Louis  XIV  of 
France.  He  issued  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of 
Nantes  in  1685,  forbidding  all  Protestantism  in  his 
iand.  He  then  brought  pressure  to  bear  on  his 
neighbor  the  Duke  of  Savoy  to  do  the  same  in  his 


*In  the  village  of  Bobbio  can  be  found  to-day  "Crom- 
well's Rampart,"  built  to  ward  off  disastrous  floods,  built 
by  the  money  he  sent  them.  Part  of  the  money  raised 
by  Cromwell  was  kept  in  England  and  invested  and  its  in- 
terest paid  regularly  by  the  English  government  until  the 
Boer  war.  when  it  was  paid  in  a  lump  sum  to  the  Wal- 
densian   church. 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  321 

land,  and  even  threatened  to  attack  him  if  he  did 
not.  As  a  result,  on  January  31,  1686,  the  duke 
forbade  the  YYaldenses  their  worship.  He  ordered 
that  their  churches  should  be  demolished,  their  pas- 
tors should  leave  his  dominions,  and  their  children 
should  be  educated  as  Catholics.  As  they  would 
not  agree  to  this,  the  combined  armies  of  France 
and  Savoy  attacked  them  on  Easter  Monday,  1680. 
Attacked  now  on  both  sides  by  France  and  Savoy, 
their  condition  was  very  grave.  But  they  happened 
to  have  among  them  a  great  general,  Henry  Ar- 
naud.  He  was  born  in  the  High  .Alps  in  1641, 
studied  theology  at  Basle  and  then  learned  the  art 
of  war  under  those  masters  of  arms,  the  Princes  of 
Orange  in  Holland.  He  went  back  to  the  Walden- 
sian  valleys  in  1670  as  pastor,  being  thus  prepared 
to  mingle  the  art  of  war  with  the  Gospel  of  peace  if 
necessary.  Fortunate  was  it  for  the  Waldenses  that 
they  had  such  a  man.  He  became  head  of  their 
army.  The  Waldenses  of  the  St.  Martin's  valley 
submitted  to  the  Catholic  army.  But  Arnaud  de- 
fended the  Pra  del  Tor  bravely.  When,  however, 
they  learned  that  their  brethren  in  the  St.  Martin's 
valley  had  submitted,  they  did  the  same,  provided 
they  would  be  given  liberty  to  depart.    In  this  war 


322    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

it  is  said  11,000  were  killed  or  died  6,000 
were  taken  prisoners,  of  whom  the  greater 
number  died  in  prison.  When  the  prisons 
were  opened  and  they  were  ordered  to  leave  the 
country  only  2,600  struggled  over  the  St.  Bernard 
pass  to  Switzerland.  Switzerland  now  became 
their  asylum.  But  Switzerland  was  too  full  of  in- 
habitants, for  the  refugees  from  France  and  Italy 
had  been  crowding  in  there  for  a  century.  So 
arrangements  were  made  for  these  Waldenses  to 
go  farther  and  many  of  them  settled  in  Germany, 
especially  in  the  Lutheran  duchy  of  Wurtenberg. 

The  Waldenses  seemed  extirpated  and  their  val- 
leys deserted.  But  they  were  not  extirpated. 
"Truth  crushed  to  earth  will  rise  again,"  and  this 
is  truer  of  lovers  of  truth,  than  of  truth  itself.  For 
the  Waldenses  began  to  get  the  homesickness  (pe- 
culiar to  the  Swiss)  for  their  native  Alps.  So  they 
planned  what  is  called  the  "Glorious  Return." 
Henry  Arnaud  went  to  Holland  and  got  money  and 
aid  there.  They  laid  their  plans  in  secret.  Secret- 
ly the  different  bands  met  in  southwestern  Switzer- 
land, only  one  of  them  having  been  arrested  on  the 
way  as  it  passed  through  the  Catholic  canton  of 
Schwytz.    They  met  August  16,  1689,  in  the  forest 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  323 

at  Prangins,  near  Nyon,  on  the  western  shore  of 
Lake  Geneva. 

After  a  fervent  prayer  for  Arnatid,  who  was  their 
leader,  they  pushed  off  in  fifteen  boats,  and  as  the 
lake  is  there  at  its  narrowest,  they  soon  landed  near 
the  town  of  Yvoire  in  Savoy  on  the  eastern  side  of 
the  lake.  There  were  800  of  them.  The  news  of 
their  departure  was  soon  made  known  and  troops 
were  dispatched  to  intercept  them  but  in  vain.  For 
they  did  not  take  the  ordinary  roads.  They  crossed 
over  the  Col  Bonhomme  and  Mt.  Cenis  passes.* 
They  passed  between  Susa  and  Exiles.  There 
they  found  2,500  soldiers  in  wait.     They  resolved 


*They  went  up  the  valley  of  the  Arve  through  St. 
Joire  and  encamped  for  the  night  at  the  bare  hill  of 
Carmen.  They  marched  the  next  day  through  Clusis 
and  Sallanches,  where  they  found  the  bridge  defended 
by  soldiers,  but  they  soon  put  them  to  flight.  They 
passed  over  the  mountain  of  Lez  Pras  and  Haute  Luce. 
They  climbed  the  pass  of  Col  Bonhomme,  west  of  the 
Alps.  Then  down  the  valley  of  the  Isere  and  through 
St.  Germain,  Seez  and  Laval.  Then  they  climbed  the 
steep  slopes  of  Mount  Iseran  and  went  toward  Mt. 
Cenis,  descending  to  Bonneval  and  Bessant.  Then  they 
climbed  Mt.  Cenis  with  great  difficulty,  as  the  snow 
was  deep,  descending  the  mountain  on  the  other  side 
to  Tourliers  by  a  precipice  rather  than  by  a  road,  and 
finally  came  to  the  valley  of  Gaillon. 


324    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

immediately  to  attack  them.  They  cut  them  in 
two,  defeated  them  and  blew  up  their  camp.  They 
then  climbed  the  mountain  of  Sci.  And  on  the 
ninth  day  of  their  jonrney,  a  Sabbath  morning,  they 
reached  the  crest  of  the  mountain  overlooking 
Fenestrelles.  There  they  knelt  down  and  thanked 
God  that  they  were  again  in  sight  of  their  native 
valleys.  They  then  descended  the  valley  of  Pragela 
and  rested  at  the  village  of  Traverse.* 

But  the  valleys  were  full  of  troops  of  the  Duke 
of  Savoy.  The  Waldeses  threw  themselves  into 
their  famous  citadel,  the  Balsille.  This  is  situated 
in  front  of  the  narrow  defile  of  Macel,  which  leads 
to  the  valley  of  St.  Martin.  Its  only  approach  is 
by  a  deep  gorge  from  the  valley  of  St.  Martin. 
And  in  this  narrow  gorge  a  few  men  could  hold  at 
bay  a  whole  army.  For  six  months  through  the 
winter  they  beat  back  an  army  of  22,000  French 


*A  remarkable  story  of  God's  providence  is  told  in 
connection  with  their  return.  When  they  reached  their 
valleys,  they  were  in  danger  of  dying  with  hunger. 
But  one  night,  a  sudden  thaw  removed  a  mass  of  snow 
from  the  fields,  when  they  discovered  a  considerable 
quantity  of  wheat  standing  in  the  earth  ready  for  the 
sickle.  It  had  been  suddenly  covered  with  snow.  On 
this  they  lived  until  other  sources  of  food  were  found. 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  325 

and  Sardinians,  defeating  every  army  sent  against 
them.  On  Sunday  morning,  April  30,  1690,  while 
Arnaud  was  preaching,  the  sentinels  discovered  the 
enemy  advancing  and  investing  the  Balsille.  On 
May  2  a  general  assault  was  made  by  the  enemy, 
but  in  vain.  On  May  12  another  assault,  but  in 
vain.  However,  by  May  14,  the  Waldenses  had 
been  driven  out  of  their  lower  entrenchments. 
They,  therefore,  finally  decided  to  evacuate  the 
Balsille,  which  they  did  during  a  thick  mist  that 
happened  to  come  up  in  the  night.  They  gained  by 
a  long  detour  of  mountain  crests,  the  northern  slope 
1  1  f  Mount  Guinevert.  When  morning  broke  the 
French  saw  them  afar  off,  looking  like  ants  as  they 
climbed  the  distant  snow-capped  Alps.  For  three 
days  they  wandered  southward  so  as  to  take  up 
their  position  in  the  Pra  del  Tor. 

But  before  they  could  reach  this  citadel,  a  most 
unexpected  thing  occurred — Savoy  had  declared 
war  against  France  because  of  the  exactions  of 
King  Louis  XIV  upon  her.  Both  parties  now  sued 
the  Waldenses  to  join  their  armies.  But  true  to 
their  own  land,  they  pledged  their  word  to  their 
former  persecutor,  the  Duke  of  Savoy.  And  when 
the  latter  was  forced  by  the  war  to  become  a  fugi- 


326    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

tive,  where  did  he  find  shelter  and  safety? — where, 
but  in  the  valleys  of  those  whom  he  had  so  severely 
persecuted.  He  was  hidden  by  them  in  a  secluded 
spot  in  the  village  of  Rora,  behind  the  Pelice  among 
the  Waldenses  whose  fathers  he  had  hunted  and 
condemned  to  death.  After  the  war  the  Waldenses 
were  permitted  to  return  and  many,  who  had  gone 
to  Switzerland,  Holland  and  Germany,  returned, 
and  the  valleys  again  became  filled  with  settlers. 
In  1698  persecutions  began  again  and  many  of  them 
went  to  Switzerland  and  Wurtemberg,  among  them 
Arnaud,  who  died  as  pastor  at  Durmenz,  Wurtem- 
berg, 1 72 1.  They  then  lived  there  in  peace,  having 
now  at  last  gained  the  right  to  worship ;  but  they 
were  not  permitted  to  live  beyond  their  valleys. 
When  Napoleon  became  ruler  of  Savoy,  they  en- 
joyed freedom  of  worship  for  a  season.  He  even 
erected  a  church  for  them  at  St.  Giovanni,  near 
Torre  Pelice.  He  once  said  to  one  of  their  pas- 
tors, "I  have  read  your  history  and  will  aid  you." 
He  gave  toward  the  salary  of  the  pastor  $200  out 
of  his  own  purse.  But  after  he  was  deposed,  they 
were  still  shut  up  in  their  valleys. 

However,  later  in  1848,  their  emancipation  was 
finally  granted  by  the  King  of  Sardinia,  and  they 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  327 

were  given  the  same  liberties  as  the  other  subjects 
of  Victor  Emanuel.  When  he  became  king  of 
Italy  in  1870,  the  Waldenses  no  longer  clung  to 
their  valleys,  but  as  soon  as  Italy  was  thrown  open, 
they  scattered  their  missionaries  all  over  the  land. 
And  in  Florence,  where  the  Madiai  had  been  ar- 
rested in  185 1  for  their  Protestantism,  and  on  June, 
1852,  condemned  to  the  galleys,  they  founded  their 
theological  seminary.  They  now  number  20,644 
communicants,  100  ministers  and  their  receipts  for 
1908-9  were  $47,000  for  church-support  and  benev- 
olences. Their  evangelization  work,  which  extends 
all  over  Italy,  proves  that  the  saying  of  Erasmus, 
"that  all  Italians  were  atheists,"  is  not  true,  for 
many  have  been  found  hungering  for  the  bread  of 
life.  The  centre  of  their  movement  is  Torre  Pelice, 
located  34  miles  from  Turin  at  the  foot  of  the  Cot- 
tian  Alps  at  the  entrance  to  the  valleys,  where  they 
have  endured  in  all  about  thirty  persecutions.  Here 
is  their  college  and  here  their  synod  meets  in  the 
Waldensian  House  on  the  first  Monday  in  Septem- 
ber, generally  continuing  in  session  for  four  days. 
Here  is  also  their  library  and  museum  in  which  is 
the  rifle  of  Janevel,  two  copies  of  Olivetans  trans- 
lation of  the  French  Bible  published  1535,  by  order 


328     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

of  their  synod,  also  many  weapons  and  valuable 
historical  documents.* 

If  Milton  has  used  his  pen  so  beautifully  for 
them  on  the  other  side  of  the  water,  Whittier  has 
also  embalmed  them  in  one  of  his  poems.  It  refers 
to  the  early  method  of  the  Waldensians  in  scatter- 
ing the  Gospel — 

"O  lady  fair  these  silks  of  mine  are  beautiful  and  rare: 
The  richest  web  of  Indian  loom,  which  beauty's  queen 

might  wear, 
And   my   pearls   are   pure   as   thy   own   fair  neck,   with 

whose  radiant  light  they  vie: 
I   have  brought  them  with  me  a  weary  way, — will   my 

gentle  lady  buy? 

The    lady   smiled   on    the    worn   old    man    through    the 

dark  and   clustering  curls, 
Which  veiled  her  brow,  as  she  bent  to  view  his  silks 

and  glittering  pearls: 
And  she  placed  their  price  in  the  old  man's  hand  and 

lightly  turned  away, 
But   she   paused  at  the   wanderer's   earnest   call, — "My 

gentle  lady  stay:" 


*These  valleys  are  well  worth  a  visit. 


Italy  and  the  Waldenses.  329 

"O   lady  fair,   I   have  yet   a   gem,  which  a   purer  lustre 

flings, 
Than  the  diamond  flash  of  the  jewelled  crown  on  the 

lofty  brow  of  kings, 
A    wonderful    pearl    of    exceeding    price,    whose    virtue 

shall  not  decay, 
W1k.sc  light  shall  be  a  spell  to  thee  and  a  blessing  on 

thy  way." 

The    lady    glanced    at    the    mirroring    steel,    where    her 

form  of  grace  was   seen, 
Where  her  eye  shone  clear,  and   her  dark  locks  waved 

their   clasping  pearls   between: 
"Bring  forth  thy  pearl  of  exceeding  worth,  thou  trav- 
eller gray  and   old, 
And  name  the  price  of  thy  precious  gem  and  my  page 

shall  count  thy  gold." 
The  cloud  went  off  from  the  pilgrim's  brow,  as  a  small 

and  meagre  book, 
Unchased  with   gold  or  gem  of  cost,  from   his  folding 

robe  he  took; 
"Here,   lady    fair,    is    the    pearl    of    prior,    may    it    prove 

as  such  to  thee: 
Nay,   keep   thy   gold,— I    ask    it   not,   for   the   Word   of 

God  is  free." 
The  hoary  traveller  went  his  way,  but  the  gift  he  left 

behind 
Hath  had  its  pure  and  perfect  work  on  that  highborn 

maiden's  mind, 


330    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

And  she  hath  turned  from  the  pride  of  sin  to  the  low- 
liness of  truth 

And  given  her  human  heart  to  God  in  its  beautiful 
hour  of  youth. 

And  she  hath  left  the  gray  old  walls,  where  an  evil 
faith  hath  power, 

The  courtly  knights  of  her  father's  train  and  the  maid- 
ens of  her  bower: 

And  she  hath  gone  to  the  Vaudois  vales  by  lordly  feet 
untrod, 

Where  the  poor  and  needy  of  earth  are  rich  in  the 
perfect  love  of  God.* 

There  is  also  another  denomination  in  Italy,  be- 
longing to  the  Alliance  of  the  Reformed  churches, 
holding  to  the  Presbyterian  system  called  the  Evan- 
gelical Italian  Church,  founded  in  1870  by  Gavazzi. 
It  has  about  forty  congregations  and  numbers  about 
2,000  communicants. 


*This  poem  was  translated  into  French,  and  be- 
came familiar  to  the  Waldenses,  but  its  author  was  un- 
known to  them  until  Mr.  Fletcher,  who  had  studied 
at  Geneva  in  1850,  and  found  its  French  translation 
there,  finally  notified  the  Waldenses  in  1875  that  Whit- 
tier  was  the  author.  The  Waldensian  synod  wrote  in 
their  name  a  letter  of  thanks  to  the  Quaker  poet  of 
America. 


illllllllllmr:^i,!in"8    -  *BB1r.Hnmi  ii iiiiii 

"•iili  mi  inn  mi iii« 


TOMB   OF  WILLIAM   OF  ORANGE 


Chapter  IV.— BRAVE  LITTLE  HOLLAND. 

HOLLAND,*  the  quaintest  country  in  Eu- 
rope, with  its  dykes,  its  windmills  and 
its  canals,  is  a  prosperous  land,  because 
of  its  Calvinism.  It  was  the  Calvinistic  doctrine  of 
the  perseverance  of  the  saints,  that  made  the  Hol- 
landers persevere,  until  they  had  crowded  out  the 
sea  by  their  dykes  and  the  Spaniards  by  their  arms. 
It  was  the  first  nation  that  gave  religious  liberty 
and  hence  became  the  asylum  of  thousands  of  the 
Reformed  driven  out  of  other  lands.  The  spirit  of 
liberty,  begotten  of  Calvinism,  gave  her  an  inspira- 
tion to  great  things,  so  that  she  became  during  part 
of  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  the 
mistress  of  the  seas  and  gained  world-wide  domin- 
ion. 

Holland  was  not  at  first  Reformed  as  it  is  now. 
There  was  a  question,  whether  it  would  be  Luth- 
eran, Anabaptist  or  Reformed.     The  first  influence 


*The  proper  name  of  this  country  is  not  Holland, 
but  the  Netherlands.  Strictly  speaking,  Holland  is 
only  one  of  the  provinces  of  the  Netherlands,  but  it 
is  one  of  the  leading  provinces  as  it  includes  the  larg- 
est cities. 

333 


334    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

seems  to  have  come  from  Luther,  as  his  doctrines 
gained  access  to  Antwerp,  for  at  that  time  Belgium 
was  linked  to  Holland.  But  in  1521,  two  of  the 
Hollanders  visited  Luther,  Hinne  Rode,  rector  of 
the  Brothers  school  at  Utrecht  and  Sylvanus. 
Luther,  it  is  said,  would  not  agree  with  their  views 
about  the  Lord's  Supper  that  it  was  merely  a 
memorial.  In  Switzerland  they  met  Ecolampadius 
•at  Basle  and  Zwingli  at  Zurich,  and  were  present 
when  the  latter  defended  his  theses  at  the  great 
conference  at  Zurich,  January  29,  1523.  Thus  the 
Netherlands  early  began  to  join  hands  with  the 
Swiss,  a  prophecy  of  what  took  place  later.  Soon 
martyrdoms  began  to  occur  in  the  Netherlands  for 
the  new  faith.  Thus  in  1525  William  Dirks  was 
martyred  at  Utrecht. 

Then  came  the  Anabaptist  movement  (1530-61). 
The  Anabaptists  were  not  Baptists,  that  is,  they  did 
not  emphasize  immersion  as  the  mode  of  baptism 
as  the  Baptists  do  now.  Some  of  them  were  for 
immersion,  but  others  for  sprinkling.  They  were 
peculiar,  however,  in  their  opposition  to  infant  bap- 
tism, holding  that  a  person  should  not  be  baptized, 
until  he  came  to  years  of  discretion.  Menno  Simon, 
their  leader,  was  a  man  of  ability,  but  he  held  er- 


Brave  Little  Holland.  335 

ratic  views  as  "that  Christ's  birth  was  not  real, — 
that  Christ  brought  his  flesh  from  heaven  and  did 
not  receive  it  from  Mary."  This  Mennonite  move- 
ment threatened  to  sweep  Holland  into  the  sects, 
but  severe  persecutions  came  on  them.  These, 
however,  seemed  to  give  Protestantism  a  new  start. 
And  this  time,  the  new  movement  was  not  Lutheran 
or  Mennonite  as  before,  but  Reformed.  It  came 
from  the  western  or  Flemish  end  of  the  Nether- 
lands, which  was  more  nearly  allied  to  the  French. 
And  it  was  thus  that  the  views  of  Calvin,  the 
Frenchman,  were  introduced  and  became  popular. 
If  any  can  be  named  as  the  reformer  of  Holland 
(although  Holland  had  no  great  reformer  to  rival 
Luther,  Zwingli  or  Calvin)  it  was  Guido  de  Bres. 
He  was  born  at  Mons  in  1522,  but  before  he  was 
25  years  of  age  he  had  become  a  Protestant,  in  spite 
of  the  teachings  of  his  strict  Catholic  mother.  When 
the  persecutions  broke  out  in  1528,  he  fled  to  Eng- 
land, where  he  spent  four  years  under  the  Polish 
Reformer  Lasco,  then  pastor  of  the  church  of  the 
foreigners  in  London.  In  that  church  he  became 
acquainted  with  the  Calvinistic  doctrine  and  gov- 
ernment. Returning  to  Liege,  he  won  great  popu- 
larity by  his  preaching,  but  was  again  compelled  to 


336    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

flee  and  went  to  Switzerland.  In  1559  he  return- 
ed to  the  southern  Netherlands,  living  at  Tournai, 
but  doing  missionary  work  at  Valenciennes  and 
even  visiting  Antwerp  in  disguise.  In  1561,  to 
show  the  authorities  that  he  and  his  friends  were 
not  revolutionary  Anabaptists,  he  drew  up  the  Bel- 
gic  Confession  of  37  articles,  modelled  after  the 
Gallic  Confession  of  the  French  Church.  This 
Confession  he  sent  to  his  ruler,  the  King  of  Spain, 
that  he  might  know  the  views  of  his  Protestant  sub- 
jects. This  creed  soon  became  popular  and  later 
was  adopted  as  the  creed  of  the  Dutch  Reformed 
Church.  In  1564  he  was  at  Brussels  at  a  conference 
with  Prince  "William  of  Orange,  and  also  took 
part  at  Metz  in  negotiations  to  unite  the  Lutherans 
and  the  Reformed.  In  1566  he  returned  to  Valen- 
ciennes, where  he  was  arrested  and  imprisoned  in 
the  castle  of  Tournai.  There  a  lady,  who  visited 
him,  said  to  him,  "she  wondered  how  he  could  eat 
or  drink  or  sleep  in  quiet."  "Madam,"  he  replied, 
"my  chains  do  not  terrify  me  or  break  my  sleep. 
On  the  contrary  I  glory  and  take  delight  in  them, 
esteeming  them  at  a  higher  rate  than  chains  and 
rings  of  gold  or  jewels  of  any  price  whatsoever. 
The   rattling   of   my   chains    is   like   the   effect   of 


Brave  Little  Holland.  337 

musical  instruments  on  my  ears :  not  that  this  effect 
comes  merely  from  the  chains,  but  because  I  am 
bound  therewith  in  maintaining  the  truth  of  the 
Gospel."  He  was  martyred  in  1567  in  front  of  the 
town  hall  at  Valenciennes. 

With  de  Bres  came  the  Calvinistic  influence.  Cal- 
vin's pupils  began  gathering  congregations.  This 
was  aided,  when  in  1565  the  Heidelberg  Catechism 
was  translated  into  Dutch.  In  1566  the  Psalms, 
which  were  sung  by  the  Calvinists,  were  trans- 
lated into  Dutch  by  Dathenus.  All  these  committed 
the  Dutch  more  and  more  to  the  Reformed  faith. 
But  before  the  church  was  fully  organized,  the 
Protestants  were  driven  out  of  their  land  by  per- 
secution and  found  an  asylum  in  northwestern  Ger- 
many. The  result  was  that  the  Dutch  church  was 
organized  on  German  soil  and  at  first  belonged  to 
the  "Churches  under  the  Cross,"  as  the  churches 
in  persecution  were  then  named.  Two  synods  were 
held,  one  at  Wesel  in  1568,  and  another  at  Emden 
in  1 571.  In  these  the  German  Reformed  Elector 
of  the  Palatinate  was  represented,  thus  uniting  the 
Dutch  and  Germans.  The  synod  at  Wesel  adopted 
the  Heidelberg  and  Calvin's  catechisms,  the  Psalms 
of  Dathenus  and  also  a  church  constitution.     At 


338     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

the  Emden  synod  the  Belgic  Confession  was  adopt- 
ed and  the  church  organization  was  completed  by- 
dividing  the  church  into  classes.  Then  the  persecu- 
tions having  lessened,  the  Dutch  went  back  to  Hol- 
land, where  the  church  was  thoroughly  organized 
by  the  synods  at  Dort  in  1574  and  1578,  and  at 
Middleburg  in  1581. 

While  the  church  was  thus  being  organized,  the 
Netherlands  were  preparing  for  a  tremendous  politi- 
cal struggle,  which  lasted  with  some  intermissions 
for  eighty  years  (1 568-1648).  And  back  of  this 
struggle  for  civil  liberty  with  Spain,  who  ruled 
Holland  at  that  time,  was  also  the  struggle  for  reli- 
gious liberty.  The  King  of  Spain  was  determined 
to  destroy  the  Reformed  and  introduced  the  In- 
quisition into  the  Netherlands.  This  the  Dutch 
could  not  bear,  and  they  rose  against  Spain  in  a 
war,  that  for  perseverance  has  never  been  equaled. 
It  began,  when  the  King  of  Spain  in  1567  ap- 
pointed the  cruel  Duke  of  Alva  governor-general 
of  the  Netherlands.  The  next  year  came  the  trum- 
pet-call to  freedom,  when  the  Duke  of  Alva  ar- 
rested and  executed  two  of  the  leading  nobles  of 
Holland,  Counts  Egmont  and  Horn ;  but  failed  to 
catch  Prince  William  of  Orange.     The  latter  had 


Brave  Little  Holland.  339 

been  put  on  his  guard  by  an  incident  many  years 
before.  For  while  hunting  with  King  Henry  II 
of  France  in  the  forest  at  Vincennes,  the  French 
king  told  him  of  the  plan  of  King  Philip  of  Spain, 
to  massacre  all  the  Protestants  in  the  Netherlands. 
William  was  at  that  time  a  Catholic,  but  his  noble 
nature  revolted  against  such  cruelty.  He  gained 
the  name  of  William  the  Silent,  because  he  never 
told  this  news.  He,  however,  though  he  kept  it 
to  himself,  determined  to  get  rid  of  the  Spanish 
garrisons  in  the  Netherlands  as  fast  as  possible. 

The  Duke  of  Alva,  having  paralyzed  the  country 
by  his  execution  of  Egment  and  Horn,  seemed  to 
have  gotten  control  of  the  whole  land;  when  sud- 
denly an  important  event  occurred.  The  cloud  was 
only  as  big  as  a  man's  hand ;  but  it  betokened  a 
coming  storm,  that  never  ceased  until  it  drew  away 
the  Netherlands  from  Spanish  control.  This  event 
was  the  news  that  the  Beggars  had  captured  Briel 
in  1572.  The  Beggars  were  the  Dutch  patriots, 
who  driven  out  of  the  land,  had  taken  to  the  sea, 
and  because  of  their  poverty  were  nicknamed 
"Beggars,"  a  name  which  they  adopted  and  made 
famous.  Having  taken  Briel,  they  then  took  Flush- 
ing in  western  Holland.     With  this,  almost  all  the 


34-0    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

cities  of  the  provinces  of  Holland  and  Zeeland  threw 
off  the  Spanish  yoke,  because  of  the  oppressions 
of  the  Duke  of  Alva.  The  duke  gathered  an  army 
and  beseiged  Haarlem  (1572-3)  and  finally  cap- 
tured it  after  a  brave  defence  of  seven  months. 
Then  he  revealed  to  them  what  Spanish  mercy  was. 
He  took  the  Dutch  citizens,  tied  them  two  and  two, 
and  threw  them  into  the  lake  of  Haarlem.  Two 
thousand,  to  whom  he  had  promised  mercy,  were 
thus  put  to  death.  In  1572  the  States  General  of 
Holland  met  at  Dort,  and  Prince  William  of 
Orange,  was  made  governor-general.  This  was 
their  formal  declaration  of  independence,  in  mak- 
ing William  of  Orange  instead  of  the  Duke  of 
Alva,  their  ruler. 

Then  the  war  began  in  earnest.  One  of  the  first 
acts  of  William  of  Orange,  who  had  been  a  Cath- 
olic, was  to  publicly  join  the  Reformed  Church,  Oc- 
tober 23,  1573.  This  occurred  just  after  the  citi- 
zens of  Alkmaar  had  repulsed  the  Spaniards  after 
a  seven  weeks  seige.  And  now  came  Leyden's 
turn.  Leyden  was,  next  to  Amsterdam,  the  largest 
city  in  the  province  of  Holland,  having  50,000  in- 
habitants. When  the  Spaniards  found  it  was  too 
strongly  fortified  to  be  taken  by  assault,  they  plant- 


Brave  Little  Holland.  341 

ed  themselves  down  before  it  for  a  long  seige,  so 
as  to  starve  it  into  surrender.  But  the  inhabitants, 
mindful  of  the  "Spanish  mercy"  at  Haarlem,  de- 
termined they  would  rather  die  than  surrender. 
The  famine  became  terrific.  Dogs,  cats,  rats,  and 
finally  the  leaves  of  the  trees  and  the  grass  in  the 
streets  was  eaten,  but  still  they  would  not  sur- 
render. "You  call  us  rat-and  dog-eaters,"  said 
the  inhabitants  to  the  Spaniards  outside  the  city. 
"But  as  long  as  a  dog  barks  and  a  cat  mews,  you 
may  rest  assured  that  you  will  not  get  the  city. 
And  when  all  is  gone,  we  will  eat  our  left  arm  and 
with  the  right  arm  defend  our  wife  and  children, 
our  religion  and  our  liberty."  Finally,  when  all 
seemed  hopeless,  help  came.  William  of  Orange, 
having  cut  the  dykes,  filled  the  country  around  with 
water,  so  that  his  vessels  could  sail  in.  And  after 
a  seige  of  about  five  months,  it  was  lifted,  October 
3.  1574.  The  deliverers  brought  food  for  the  starv- 
ing. And  immediately  with  thankful  hearts,  they 
streamed  to  the  Great  Reformed  church  there  to 
thank  God  for  their  deliverance.  Then  as  a  thank- 
offering  to  God  they  founded  a  university,  the 
great  University  of  Leyden,  in  1575.  The  relief 
of  Leyden  seemed  to  be  the  turning-point  in  the 


342    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

fight  for  freedom,  for  the  peace  of  Ghent  came  in 
1576,  which  united  the  seventeen  provinces  of  the 
Netherlands  against  Spanish  tyranny. 

Meanwhile  the  Reformed  doctrines  spread  every- 
where. Thus  in  Antwerp  Feb.  17,  1577,  the  monks 
were  forbidden  to  preach  and  the  Reformed  had 
twelve  places  of  worship.  The  Cathedral  was  used 
by  the  Reformed,  the  Catholics  only  using  the  choir. 
The  Jesuits  and  Franciscans  were  driven  out  of 
Utrecht.  During  all  this  time,  while  the  southern 
and  western  part  of  the  Netherlands  had  become 
free  from  Spain,  Amsterdam  remained  in  the  hands 
of  the  Spaniards.  The  Dutch,  in  1577,  blockaded 
Amsterdam,  and  at  last,  in  February,  1578,  Am- 
sterdam also  accepted  the  peace  of  Ghent,  and 
joined  the  Dutch.  At  first,  however,  the  Reformed 
worship  was  allowed  only  outside  of  the  city.  But 
in  the  city  there  were  18,000  Reformed  to  2,000 
Catholics.  The  result  was  that  William  Bardes 
formed  a  plan  to  overthrow  the  authorities  and  get 
the  Reformed  worship  introduced.  On  Sunday, 
May  25,  1578,  as  the  Reformed  held  their  fifth 
church-service  outside  of  the  city,  they  gathered  at 
St.  Anthony's  dyke,  under  the  leadership  of  Thom- 
as Van  Til,  the  onlv  Dutch  minister  who  was  also 


Brarc  Little  Holland.  343 

a  noble.     As  they  returned  to  the  city,  their  plan 
was  laid.     The  next  day,  Bardes  and  four  others 
went  to  the  city-hall  to  find  out  the  position  of  the 
magistrates  toward  the  Reformed.    When  he  gain- 
ed nothing  from  them,  one  of  his  companions  left 
the  council  chamber  and  went  to  the  free  steps  of 
the  palace  and  waved  his  broad  hat  as  a  signal. 
This  was  a  market-day  and  the  Dam    (the  open 
place  before  the  palace)  was  crowded  with  people. 
Suddenly  a  sailor  unrolled  a  large  flag  and  waving 
it  cried  out,  "Every  one  who  loves  the  Prince  of 
Orange  follow  me."     Bardes  and  his  armed  men 
captured  the  whole  council,  while  outside  the  people 
began  to  clear  the  Dam  and  to  arrest  the  Franciscan 
monks  and  the  priests.    On  May  28  a  new  council 
was  elected  and  Bardes  was  made  mayor.    The  Re- 
formed   faith   was   now    introduced    into   the   city, 
although  the  Lutheran  and  Mennonite  worship  was 
allowed   and   even   the   Catholics   were   allowed   to 
have   worship   in   private   houses.        On   May   29 
Haarlem    followed    Amsterdam    and    thus    all    the 
province  of  Holland  was  lost  to  the  Spaniards.  On 
July  26,  1578,  came  the  formal  declaration  of  the 
independence  of  the  Dutch  from  Spain. 

But  with  prosperity  came  clanger.     The  Spanish 


344     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

government,  finding  it  could  not  get  rid  of  Prince 
William  of  Orange  by  fair  means,  determined  to 
get  rid  of  him  by  foul.  If  it  could  not  conquer 
him,  it  would  try  to  have  him  assassinated,  and  in 
all  nine  dastardly  attempts  were  made  on  his  life. 
In  1580  the  Spanish  government  offered  25,000 
gold  crowns  for  any  one  who  would  assassinate 
him.  Two  main  attempts  were  made  on  his  life. 
The  first  was  on  Sunday,  March  18,  1582,  as  he  was 
leaving  his  dining  hall,  a  young  man  stepped  for- 
ward with  a  petition.  The  prince  took  it,  when  the 
man  drew  a  pistol  and  shot  him.  The  bullet  passed 
under  his  right  ear,  through  his  mouth  and  other 
jaw.  It,  however,  did  not  prove  fatal,  and  on  May 
2  the  prince  went  to  the  cathedral  at  Antwerp  to 
offer  thanksgiving  for  his  deliverance.  But  though 
he  lived,  his  wife  died.  For  his  wife,  Charlotte  de 
Bourbon,  collapsed  because  of  the  alarm  and  anx- 
iety and  died  a  few  days  later.  She  was  buried  in 
the  cathedral  at  Antwerp.*  The  Prince  of  Orange 
the  next  year  married  Louisa  Teligny,  the  daughter 
of  Admiral  Coligny. 


*For  her  life,   see  my  "Famous  Women  of  the  Re- 
formed  Church." 


Brave  Little  Holland.  345 

The  last  attempt  on  the  life  of  the  Prince  of 
Orange  was  made  at  Delft,  July  10,  1584,  where 
a  man  named  Gerard  appeared,  wanting  a  passport. 
He  held  the  passport  in  his  hand,  waiting  for 
Prince  William  to  sign  it.  The  moment  the  prince's 
eyes  were  turned  from  him,  he  sent  three  bullets 
through  him.  The  prince  staggered,  crying  out, 
"O  my  God,  have  mercy  on  my  soul  and  on  this 
poor  people."  In  a  few  moments  he  was  dead.  So 
passed  away  one  of  the  greatest  statesmen  and 
generals  the  Reformed  Church  has  ever  produced. 
Indeed  one  of  the  greatest  men  Europe  has  pro- 
duced. He  is  buried  in  the  new  church  at  Delft, 
where  is  a  magnificent  monument.  Beneath  a  can- 
opy supported  by  marble  pillars  and  columns,  lies 
the  effigy  of  the  prince.  It  is  of  white  marble  and 
lies  on  a  black  marble  sarcophagus.  At  the  head 
of  the  statue  is  a  bronze  statue  of  the  prince,  in 
military  uniform.  A  dog  sustains  the  feet  of  the 
recumbent  figure  in  memory  of  his  favorite  dog, 
who  saved  his  life  from  assassination  in  1572  at 
M  alines. 

The  year  1584  brought  to  the  Netherlands  not 
only  the  loss  of  the  Prince  of  Orange,  but  also  the 
loss   of   Antwerp.     The   Spaniards   captured   Ant- 


346    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

werp  August  17,  1584.  But  that  proved  to  be  the 
destruction  of  Antwerp's  prosperity,  for,  with  the 
departure  of  the  Protestants,  its  industry  and  cap- 
ital went  to  Amsterdam.  Only  toward  the  end  of 
the  nineteenth  century  did  Antwerp  begin  to  re- 
gain the  importance  as  a  great  seaport  which,  by 
her  location,  she  ought  to  have.  From  this  time  the 
Flemish  part  of  the  Netherlands,  of  which  Brussels 
and  Antwerp  were  the  leading  cities,  fell  back  to 
the  Catholics,  while  the  Reformed  religion  became 
limited  to  the  Dutch  provinces. 

But  though  Prince  William  of  Orange  was  dead, 
he  left  a  remarkable  line  of  princes  after  him. 
His  two  sons,  though  not  such  broad-minded  states- 
men as  himself,  yet  proved  themselves  very  able 
as  generals  and  diplomats.  His  second  son,  Mau- 
rice,* rose  to  take  his  father's  place.  He  early 
revealed  remarkable  military  genius  by  his  vic- 
tories (1590-4)  so  that  he  drove  Spain  away 
from  the  Rhine  river,  whose  mouths  now  came 
under  Dutch  control.  It  was  during  his  life,  that 
the  Dutch  began  to  develop  their  remarkable  com- 


*His  oldest  son  had  been  kept  by  Spain  as  a  hostage 
since  his  youth  and  had  been  educated  as  a  Catholic. 
He  therefore  was  counted  out  by  the  Dutch. 


Brave  Little  Holland.  347 

merce  to  the  ends  of  the  earth,  by  the  formation  of 
their  East  and  West  India  companies.  This  pre- 
pared the  way  for  their  great  naval  supremacy. 

Holland's  victories  now  pass  from  the  land  to  the 
sea.  Holland  had  four  great  admirals,  all  good 
members  of  the  Reformed  Church.  Of  these,  Ad- 
miral Jacob  Van  Heemskerk  was  the  first,  who 
(1596)  tried  to  find  the  northwestern  passage 
around  North  America,  which  has  just  been  discov- 
ered a  few  years  before  by  Amundsen.  Van  Heems- 
kerk defeated  the  Spanish  fleet  under  the  very  guns 
of  the  Spanish  garrison  at  Gibraltar,  but  he  was 
killed  in  the  battle.  His  body  was  brought  home 
and  buried  in  the  Old  church  at  Amsterdam,  where 
his  tomb  bears  the  inscription: 

"Here  lies  Heemskerk. 
Heemskerk!    who    dared    through    polar    ice,    and    iron 

hail  to  steer, 
Left  to  his  country  fame:  at  strong  Gibraltar,  life:  his 

honored  body  here." 

The  most  important  religious  event  during  Prince 
Maurice's  reign  as  Governor-General  was  the  fa- 
mous synod  of  Dort  (1618-19).  Calvinism  had 
become  so  high  in  its  development  into  supra  lap- 


3-|S    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

sarianism  *  that  a  reaction  came  about.  Arminius, 
who  was  elected  professor  of  theology  at  Leyden 
in  1603,  taught  lower  views  of  predestination  and 
of  the  fall  of  man.  A  storm  was  gathering  around 
his  head  when  he  died  in  1609.  But  his  followers 
continued  to  spread  Arminian  doctrines.  The  Ar- 
minians  were  also  called  Remonstrants,  because 
they  presented  (1610)  to  the  two  states  of  Holland 
and  Friesland,  an  address  consisting  of  five  arti- 
cles called  a  Remonstrance,  which  was  directed 
against  Calvinism.  The  Calvinists  then  prepared 
(1611)  a  Counter-remonstrance  which  has  become 
known  as  the  "Five  points  of  Calvinism."  So 
finally  to  decide  the  controversy,  it  was  determined 
to  hold  a  synod  at  Dort,  November  13,  1618.  To 
it  the  Dutch  invited  the  Reformed  churches  of 
France,  Switzerland,  Germany  and  England  to  send 
delegates.  All  came,  except  the  delegates  of  France, 
who  were  prevented  from  coming  by  their  king. 

The  opening  and  closing  services  of  the  synod 
were  held  in  the  Great  church  at  Dort,  the  first 


*The  supra  lapsarians  held  that  the  decree  of  elec- 
tion came  before  the  decree  of  creation.  The  Infra- 
lapsarians  were  lower  and  held  that  it  came  after  the 
decree  of  creation. 


Brave  Little  Holland.  349 

being  held  in  Latin ;  but  the  sessions  of  the  synod 
were  held  elsewhere.  At  this  synod  the  Supra- 
lapsarians  tried  to  gain  the  control.  They  gained 
the  president,  Bogerman,  but  the  ultimate  decisions 
of  the  synod,  as  given  in  the  Canons  of  Dort,  are 
lower  than  supralapsarianism.  The  synod  con- 
demned Arminianism  and  formulated  its  doctrinal 
decisions  in  the  Canons  of  Dort,  which  have  since 
become  one  of  the  creeds  of  the  Dutch  church.  The 
synod  continued  six  months,  ending  May  25,  1619. 
The  Arminians  were  then  banished  from  the  Neth- 
erlands by  Prince  Maurice.  But  the  Arminians 
soon  degenerated  into  Socinians,  so  that  all  the 
Remonstrant  churches  of  Holland  are  now  practi- 
cally Unitarian. 

During  the  religious  controversy  between  the  Cal- 
vinists  and  Arminians,  there  arose  also  a  political 
controversy  between  the  two  parties  in  the  Nether- 
lands. Prince  Maurice  led  the  aristocratic  party 
and  the  great  statesman,  Barnevelt,  led  the  repub- 
lican party.  Maurice  championed  the  centralization 
of  the  government  in  the  States-General.  Barne- 
velt, the  state's  rights  over  against  the  central  gov- 
ernment. This  controversy  unfortunately  became 
mixed    with    the    religious    controversy,    Maurice 


350    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

championing  the  Calvinists  and  Barnevelt  the  Re- 
monstrants. The  controversy  finally  led  to  the  un- 
fortunate execution  of  Barnevelt  on  the  charge  of 
conspiracy  against  the  unity  of  the  government. 
He  was  executed  May  13,  1619,  on  a  scaffold  in  the 
Binnenhof  at  the  Hague.  Grotius,  who  sympa- 
thized with  Barnevelt  politically,  was  imprisoned  in 
the  fortress  of  Loevenstein,  near  Gorcum,  but  by 
the  aid  of  his  wife  he  escaped  (1621)  by  being  car- 
ried out  in  a  book-chest  in  which  he  was  covered 
over  by  soiled  linen  for  the  laundry.  He  finally 
died  in  Sweden. 

Prince  Maurice  died  1625  and  the  Orange  fam- 
ily presented  another  statesman  to  Holland  to  lead 
her  fortunes  in  his  place,  Prince  Frederick  Henry, 
the  step-brother  of  Maurice  and  the  son  of  Louisa 
Teligny,  the  daughter  of  Admiral  Coligny.  Under 
him  the  unity  of  the  states  became  more  consoli- 
dated and  the  prosperity  of  the  Netherlands  reached 
its  climax.  He  was  of  a  broader  spirit  than  Mau- 
rice and  permitted  the  Arminians  to  return  to  Hol- 
land. Holland  took  part  in  the  Thirty  Years  war 
(1621-1647)  and  in  1648,  after  eighty  years  of 
struggle  for  independence,  it  at  last  gained  separa- 
tion from  Spain,  being  at  last  recognized  by  Spain. 


Brave  Little  Holland.  351 

During  that  war,  the  Dutch  did  much  to  protect 
the  Reformed  in  the  northern  Rhine-region,  espe- 
cially, when  they  had  possession  of  Wesel* 

During  the  reign  of  Prince  Frederick  Henry, 
Holland  spread  her  influence  far  and  wide.  It  was 
at  that  time  that  Admiral  Peter  Hein  gained  his 
wonderful  victory  over  the  Spaniards,  by  capturing 
their  Silver  Fleet  in  1628,  at  Matanzas,  Cuba.  He 
had  already  captured  the  sugar-fleet  of  the  Span- 
iards and  now  crowned  it  with  this  victory.  The 
value  of  the  silver  captured  was  14  millions  sterling 
florins  ($5,600,000)  but  really  worth  much  more 
than  that.  No  wonder  Holland  went  wild  with 
joy,  for  so  much  money  meant  great  prosperity. 
Hein  was  a  remarkable  combination  of  great  daring 
and  yet  of  great  prudence.  He  was  killed  in  a 
battle  with  the  Spanish  pirate  at  Dunkirk  June  30, 
1629,  and  buried  at  Delft,  in  the  Old  Reformed 
church.  The  Latin  inscription  there  calls  him,  "a 
new  Argonaut,  who  brought  home  the  golden  fleece 
of  the  King  of  Spain,"  referring  to  his  victory 
over  the  "silver  fleet." 


*The  close  of  the  war  occurred  after  Prince  Henry's 
death. 


352    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Admiral  Hein  was  succeeded  by  Admiral  Martin 
Tromp,  whose  victory  over  the  Spanish  fleet  in 
the  English  channel  in  1629  gave  him  great  fame. 
As  a  result  of  the  prosperity,  brought  about  by  the 
successes  under  Prince  Frederick  Henry,  the  coun- 
try became  prosperous,  but  the  church  became 
worldly  and  luxury  prevailed.  In  1677  occurred  the 
tulip  craze.  For  one  bulb  2,500  florins  were  paid, 
for  another  4,600  and  a  coach  with  a  span  of  horses 
was  given  for  still  another  tulip.  The  craze  soon 
subsided,  but  strange  to  say  about  a  century  later 
was  followed  by  a  similar  hyacinth  craze.  For  the 
Dutch  are  great  lovers  of  flowers  and  magnificent 
are  the  beds  of  hyacinths  and  narcissus  around 
Haarlem.  Art  also  flourished  and  the  famous 
Dutch  School  of  Painting  arose,  of  which  Rem- 
brandt is  the  most  famous.  Rembrandt,  Durer  and 
Holbein  compose  the  great  trio  of  Reformed  paint- 
ers. He  was  born  about  1607  at  Leyden,  but  went 
to  Amsterdam  in  1631,  where  he  died,  1669.  His 
skill  lay  in  his  art  of  lights  and  shadows.  His 
greatest  painting  is  at  the  Ryks  Museum,  Amster- 
dam, Snd  is  named  "The  Night-watch,"  although 
his  paintings  at  the  Hague,  as  "The  Anatomy,"  and 
"Simeon  in  the  Temple,"  are  famous. 


Brave  Little  Holland.  353 

After  the  death  of  Prince  Frederick  Henry 
(1647)  his  son  William,  by  his  beautiful  wife, 
Princess  Amalia  of  Solms,*  ruled  for  but  a  brief 
period.  After  his  death  dissensions  arose  between 
the  states  of  Holland,  and  the  Governor-General. 
Xo  Governor-General  was  elected,  but  the  govern- 
ment was  entrusted  to  a  Pensionary  named  John 
De  Witt,  who  proved  to  be  a  great  statesman. 
During  his  term  of  office,  Holland  gained  great 
fame  with  her  navy,  Admiral  Tromp  being  her 
leader.  By  this  time  the  rising  navy  of  England 
began  to  be  jealous  of  the  prominence  of  the  Dutch 
navy.  In  a  battle,  Admiral  Tromp  defeated  the 
English  navy  under  Blake  (1653),  but  Tromp  was 
killed  in  battle,  brought  home  and  buried  in  the 
Old  church  at  Delft.  Pie  was  the  victor  of  32 
naval  battles.  On  his  tomb  is  an  inscription  which 
translated  freely  runs  thus : 

"His  image  deeply  graved  on  each  true  patriot's  heart, 
Shall  far  outlast  the  marble  wrought  by  human  art." 

Tromp  was  succeeded  by  Admiral  de  Ruyter.  He 
was  born  at  Flushing,  where  St.  James'  church  was 


'Her  portrait  is  in  the  picture-gallery  of  the  Hague. 


354    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

the  scene  of  his  boyish  escapade.  At  ten  years  of 
age  he  climbed  to  the  pinnacle  of  its  steeple,  and 
got  down  safely,  although  all  the  town  held  its 
breath  to  see  him  do  it.  The  child  was  father  of 
the  man.  He  was  a  sailor-born  and  ran  away  to 
become  a  sailor.  He  soon  gained  great  fame  for 
his  skill  in  navigation  and  for  his  ability  in  war. 
He  was  the  only  foreigner  who  dared  sail  up  the 
Thames  river  toward  London  (1667)  and  humble 
England  by  gaining  a  victory  over  the  combined 
English  and  French  fleets.  He  was  the  last  great 
naval  hero  of  Holland.  He  died  April  29,  1676, 
and  is  buried  in  the  New  Church  at  Amsterdam. 
After  his  victory  over  the  combined  fleets,  these 
lines  were  found  everywhere  in  Holland : 

Behold  the  hero,  Holland's  strong,  right  hand. 
The  Savior  of  the  imperilled  fatherland 
Who  three  times  forced  two  kingdoms  in  one  year 
To  strike  the  flag  and  filled  their  lands  with  fear; 
The  fleet's  true  soul,  the  arms  hy  which  God  wrought 
The  victory  that  peace  and  honor  brought. 

We  have  referred  to  these  naval  heroes  in  order 
to  complete  the  list  of  great  Reformed  generals, 
admirals  and  statesmen  that  Holland  has  given  to 
the  Reformed  Church.    These  admirals  were  godly 


Brave  Little  Holland.  355 

men  and  De  Ruyter  was  perhaps  the  greatest  of 
all  the  admirals  and  statesmen  that  Holland  has 
given.  When  Emperor  William  I  of  Germany 
visited  Amsterdam  in  1891,  he  laid  a  wreath  on  the 
tomb  of  De  Ruyter.  And  Flushing  in  1841  erected 
a  fine  bronze  statue  to  his  honor. 

The  Dutch,  however,  were  not  as  fortunate  on 
land  as  on  sea.  Against  the  designs  of  King  Louis 
XIV  of  France  to  incorporate  Holland  in  France, 
they  formed  a  triple-alliance  in  1668-72,  with  Eng- 
land and  Sweden.  But  after  the  alliance  fell, 
France  threw  its  armies  into  Holland.  Conde  and 
Turenne  conquered  the  provinces  of  Guelders, 
Overyssel  and  Utrecht.  Amsterdam  was  saved 
only  by  the  Dutch  breaking  the  dykes  and  inun- 
dating their  country.  However,  the  people  believed 
that  in  this  war  they  had  been  betrayed  by  Pension- 
ary De  Witt.  They  rose  against  him  and  put  him 
to  death  in  1672,  at  the  Hague  in  the  prison  (the 
Gefangenpoort). 

A  theological  controversy,  only  less  bitter  than 
that  of  Dort,  arose  in  the  latter  part  of  the  seven- 
teenth century.  The  Hollanders  were  ever  stren- 
uous for  the  faith  once  delivered  to  the  saints. 
They  became  divided  into  two  parties,  the  Voetians 


356    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

and  Cocceians.  In  1685  Maresius  attacked  Coc- 
ceius  for  his  lax  views  on  the  Sabbath  and  Voetius 
attacked  him  for  his  doctrine  of  forgiveness  of  sin. 
This  controversy  entered  politics  as  in  the  days  of 
Dort.  The  Cocceians  favored  the  state's  interfer- 
ence in  the  church  affairs,  while  the  Voetians  op- 
posed it.  The  Cocceians  also  opposed  William  III 
succeeding  his  father  William  II,  as  Governor- 
General,  while  the  Voetians  opposed  it.  And  when 
the  Cocceians  gained  the  omission  of  the  prayer 
for  the  Prince  of  Orange  from  the  Sabbath  wor- 
ship, the  Voetians  were  greatly  incensed.  When 
William  III  finally  became  Governor-General  in 
1672  the  Cocceians  went  under.  They  demanded  a 
synod  like  that  of  Dort,  so  as  to  settle  the  differ- 
ences in  the  church,  but  it  was  refused.  In  addi- 
tion to  this  division,  both  Voetians  and  Cocceians 
finally  split  into  parties.  The  former  divided  into 
old  or  dead  and  new  or  living.  The  Cocceians  di- 
vided into  the  green  and  serious,  the  former  em- 
phasizing Biblical  interpretation,  the  latter  practi- 
cal religion,  the  latter  being  led  by  F.  A.  Lampe, 
professor  of  theology  at  Utrecht.  Finally,  peace 
was  brought  about  by  the  election  in  the  theological 
department  of  each  of  the  universities  of  a  repre- 


Brave  Little  Holland.  357 

sentative  from  each  type:  thus  a  Voetian  for  the 
chair  of  systematic  theology,  a  Cocceian  for  the 
chair  of  exegesis  and  a  Lampean  for  the  chair  of 
practical  theology.  But  the  distinctions  between 
them  were  carried  to  somewhat  ridiculous  ex- 
tremes. The  Voetians  wore  their  hair  short,  the 
Cocceians  long.  The  Voetians  called  Sunday  "the 
day  of  rest,"  the  Cocceians,  "the  Lord's  day."  The 
Voetians  lived  plainly  and  dressed  moderately,  the 
Cocceians  dressed  fashionably  and  lived  luxurious- 
ly. The  former  was  composed  of  the  common  peo- 
ple, the  latter  of  the  aristocracy. 

The  line  of  Orange  produced  another  of  its  great 
statesmen  to  become  Governor-General  (which  of- 
fice was  now  revived)  in  William  III,  1672-1702. 
lie,  aided  by  Brandenburg  and  Spain,  defeated 
France.  In  1688  he  was  made  King  of  England, 
as  his  wife,  Mary,  was  the  daughter  of  the  deposed 
King  James  II,  of  England.  He  gained  the  victory 
of  the  battle  of  the  Boyne  and  became  the  defender 
of  liberty  and  of  Protestantism. 

During  all  this  time,  the  Reformed  church  of  the 
Netherlands  adhered  closely  to  its  Calvinistic 
standards.  Tn  the  seventeenth  century,  it  did  a 
great   foreign   missionary  work  in  Java,   Amboyna 


358    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

and  Formosa,  especially  in  the  East  Indias,  and  had 
for  a  time  a  small  missionary  seminary  at  Leyden 
under  Prof.  Walaus  (1622-32).  In  the  seventeenth 
century,  two  great  philosophers  lived  in  Holland, 
Descartes  and  Spinoza,  whose  influence  was  not 
for  orthodoxy.  The  former  led  to  the  philosophy 
of  doubt,  the  latter  developed  pantheism. 

Still  Holland  did  not  really  depart  from  her 
creeds  until  the  French  revolution  had  come  and 
the  infidel  thought  of  the  nineteenth  century  had 
crept  in  until  it  gained  control  of  her  universities. 
Later  Biblical  criticism  through  Kuenen  swept  away 
much  of  the  faith.  But  within  the  last  few  years 
there  has  been  a  strong  tide  in  the  State  church 
toward  Evangelical  theology.  In  1816  the  church 
and  state  were  united  and  in  1834  the  free  or 
Christian  Reformed  church  was  organized  as  a  pro- 
test against  the  control  of  the  state  over  the  church. 
It  founded  a  theological  seminary  at  Kempen 
(1854).  In  1886  there  was  another  secession  from 
the  state  church  by  the  "Doleerenden,"  who  in  1892 
united  with  the  Christian  Reformed  denomination, 
bringing  with  it  the  Free  University  of  Amsterdam 
as  its  school.  So  that  the  Christian  Reformed 
church  now  has  a  seminary  at  Kampen  and  a  uni- 


Brave  Little  Holland.  359 

versity  at  Amsterdam.  The  late  prime  minister  of 
Holland,  Dr.  Kuyper,  is  a  minister  in  this  united 
church.  Prof.  Bavinck,  formerly  of  the  theological 
seminary  at  Kampen,  is  now  a  distinguished  profes- 
sor of  theology  at  the  Free  University  at  Amster- 
dam. There  are  ahout  two  millions  of  adherents 
of  the  National  Reformed  Church.  The  Free 
Church  has  ahout  82,000  members. 

A  very  interesting  institution  in  Holland  is  the 
Netherlands  Missionary  Society,  located  at  Rotter- 
dam, the  oldest  and  largest  of  the  Dutch  Foreign 
Missionary  Societies.  In  1791  an  infidel  physician 
of  Rotterdam  named  Theodosius  Vanderkemp,  was 
saved  from  drowning  at  Dort,  by  a  providence, 
when  a  water-spout  struck  his  boat,  overturning  it 
and  drowning  his  wife  and  daughter  before  his  eyes. 
He  was  dragged  a  mile  down  stream  but  was  finally 
saved  by  some  sailors  on  a  boat.  His  infidelity 
went  to  the  winds  in  the  face  of  death.  He  became 
a  Christian  and  decided  to  be  a  missionary.*  He 
offered  his  services  to  the  London  Missionary  So- 
ciety and  was  sent  by  them,  in  1798,  to  South  Af- 


*For  an  account   of  the  life  of  Vanderkemp   see   my 
'Famous   Missionaries   of  the   Reformed   Church." 


360     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

rica.  But  before  he  left,  he  organized  a  mission- 
ary society  at  Rotterdam,  which  has  since  grown 
into  the  Netherlands  Missionary  Society,  the  other 
foreign  missionary  societies  of  Holland  being  off- 
shoots from  it.  This  Society  has  had  a  long  and 
useful  work  in  the  Dutch  East  Indias.  It  had  one 
of  the  greatest  of  missionaries  and  also  one  of  the 
greatest  of  mission-fields.  Rev.  Jan  Kam,  "the 
apostle  of  the  Moluccas,"  was  not  really  a  mis- 
sionary but  went  out  as  a  Dutch  chaplain.  But 
from  181 5-1833,  he  did  a  great  missionary  work 
among  the  heathen  in  the  fields  of  this  society  in 
the  Spice  Islands.  With  his  own  hand  he  baptized 
8,000  people.  He  founded  a  teachers  seminary  at 
Amboyna,  his  home,  and  died  there  greatly  honor- 
ed, in  1833.  He  was  a  modern  Apostle  Paul,  "in 
journey ings  often,  in  perils  of  water  and  of  rob- 
bers, in  perils  by  the  heathen  in  the  wilderness  and 
in  the  sea."  His  self-denying  labors,  which  short- 
ened his  life,  have  gone  up  before  God  as  a  sweet 
smelling  savor,  sweeter  than  the  delicious  odor 
from  those  Spice  Islands. 

The  great  mission-field  of  this  society  was  in 
the  island  of  Celebes,  at  the  promontory  of  Mina- 
hassa.     This  mission  was  begun  in  1822  and  made 


Brave  Little  Holland.  361 

rapid  progress.  The  people  flocked  to  the  churches. 
One  of  the  missionaries,  Riedel,  baptized  over  9,000 
and  received  into  the  church  3,800.  His  compan- 
ions, Schwarz  baptized  13,068,  and  Wilken,  7,000. 
By  1873,  out  of  a  population  of  110,000  Alikures, 
80,000  had  become  adherents  of  Christianity  and 
14,000  were  communicants.  From  1740-80,  77,571 
Alikures  were  baptized.  In  1893  there  were  200 
congregations  and  125  schools.  The  whole  district 
was  changed  in  its  appearance.  Prof.  Wallace,  the 
great  English  scientist,  says  "Forty  years  ago  the 
land  was  a  wilderness,  the  people,  a  multitude  of 
naked  barbarians,  who  decorated  their  roughly 
made  huts  with  human  skulls.  The  land  is  now  a 
garden,  the  villages  are  now  all  model  villages. 
The  streets  are  covered  with  beautiful  strips  of 
green  sward  and  bordered  by  ever  blooming  hedges 
of  roses." 

In  this  brief  religious  history  of  the  Netherlands, 
it  is  easy  to  see  that  there  are  many  sacred  places 
in  the  Reformed  Church  of  the  Netherlands.  Ant- 
werp, now  in  Belgium,  was  at  one  time  strongly 
Protestant,  even  its  beautiful  cathedral.  Going 
eastward,  Flushing  was  the  birthplace  of  DeRuyter, 
and  has  his  monument.     Then  comes  Dort,  where 


362    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

the  synods  met  in  1574,  1578,  and  161 8.  The  great 
synod  of  Dort  (1618-9)  held  its  sessions  in  the  city 
Doelen,  or  town-armory,  which  is  now  used  as  a 
female  prison.  It  is  on  a  narrow  street,  a  block  or 
two  from  the  main  thoroughfare,  and  not  far  from 
the  St.  Augustine's  church.  But  it  is  difficult  to 
get  admission  to  it  because  it  is  now  used  as  a 
prison.  And  besides,  the  whole  interior  has  been 
altered  since  the  synod.  The  opening  and  closing 
services  of  the  synod  were  held  in  the  Great  church. 
Rotterdam  has  the  office  of  the  Netherlands 
Mission  Society.  Delft  has  the  tomb  of  Prince 
William  of  Orange,  in  the  New  Church,  and  also 
of  Admirals  Hein  and  Tromp  in  the  Old  Church. 
The  Hague  has  the  Dutch  parliament  hall,  which 
was  the  cradle  of  religious  liberty  for  Europe. 
Ley  den  has  its  relic  of  its  awful  seige  in  its  fa- 
mous university,  and  Amsterdam  has  the  tomb  of 
Van  Heemskerk  in  the  Old  Church  and  of  De 
Ruyter  in  the  New  Church.  An  interesting  place  in 
Amsterdam  is  the  English  Reformed  Church,  just 
off  Calvin  street  in  the  Bagynhof.  This  quaint 
chapel  was  originally  Catholic,  having  been  built 
in  1400,  but  in  1607  was  given  to  the  English  for 
their   worship.      It   is   situated   in   the   midst  of   a 


Brave  Little  Holland.  363 

Catholic  Women's-home,  who  look  askance  on  this 
worship  of  the  heretics  in  their  midst.  One  of  its 
pastors,  Rev.  David  Thomson,  greatly  aided  the 
Pennsylvania  Germans  by  the  organization  of  a 
Society  in  England  (1752-63)  to  help  them.  The 
General  Assembly  of  the  Scotch  church  donated 
about  $6,000  to  this  fund.  The  university  library 
at  Utrecht  is  also  very  interesting  to  the  historical 
student.  It  contains  the  first  edition  of  the  Heidel- 
berg Catechism,  probably  the  only  copy,  and  is 
rich  in  works  on  that  catechism,  mainly  through  the 
efforts  of  the  late  Prof.  Doudes. 


Chapter     V.  — HUNGARY,     PICTURESQUE 
BUDA-PESTH  AND  THE  BLUE  DANUBE. 

BUDA-PESTH  is  without  doubt,  one  of  the 
most  beautifully  located  cities  in  Europe. 
It  is  picturesquely  situated  on  both  sides 
of  the  broad  majestic  Danube  river,  with  its  cita- 
del of  Buda  overlooking  the  river  from  west,  being 
230  feet  above  it.  It  is  a  city  of  about  750,000, — 
the  second  in  the  Austrian  empire.  To  the  beauty 
of  its  location,  is  added  the  beauty  of  its  public 
buildings,  especially  of  its  symmetrical  Parliament 
House,  one  of  the  most  attractive  buildings  in  Eu- 
rope. Just  north  of  Buda-Pesth,  about  an  hour's 
ride  distant,  are  the  ruins  of  an  old  fortress,  Vis- 
igrad,  one  of  the  most  impressive  ruined  castles  in 
Europe. 

Hungary  is  Catholic.  Of  its  populaton  of  near- 
ly twenty  millions,  nearly  nine  millions  are  Hun- 
garians and  of  these  about  two  millions  are  Re- 
formed. Protestantism  in  Hungary  did  not,  as  in 
Bohemia,  go  back  before  the  reformation.  But,  in 
the  reformation  when  the  new  doctrines  entered, 
the  question  was  whether  it  would  become  Luth- 
eran or  Reformed.  Geographically  it  was  equi- 
36S 


366    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

distant  from  the  centre  of  each  of  these  Protestant 
churches,  Wittenberg  and  Geneva.  At  first  it  in- 
clined toward  Lutheranism.  But  the  Magyars  are 
a  very  peculiar  people- among  the  peoples  of  Eu- 
rope. They  are  the  only  Semitic  race  in  Europe, 
the  rest  being  of  Aryan  or  Indo-Germanic  stock. 
The  Semitic  races,  like  the  Jews,  always  magnified 
God's  sovereignty.  So  these  Magyars  found  more 
satisfaction  in  the  Calvinistic  doctrines  than  in  the 
Lutheran. 

The  great  reformer  of  Hungary  was  Devay,  or 
as  he  is  more  correctly  named  Matthew  Biro  of 
Devay,  Devay  being  his  birth-place.  Devay  studied 
under  Luther  in  1529  and  came  back  to  Buda, 
which  already  had  quite  a  number  of  adherents  of 
Protestantism.  He  was  imprisoned  for  preaching 
Lutheranism  but  was  set  free.  He  continued 
preaching  the  Gospel  and  again  visited  Germany  and 
Wittenberg  in  1541.  But  later  he  came  under  the 
influence  of  the  Swiss  reformers  and  left  Lutheran- 
ism to  follow  Calvin.  For  no  one  did  Luther  grieve 
more  than  at  the  loss  of  Devay  to  the  Reformed. 
Devay  carried  Hungary  with  him  over  to  the  Re- 
formed. In  his  later  life  he  labored  at  Debreczin, 
where  he  died  about  1545. 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pcsth.  367 

With  Devay  labored  another  reformer,  who  is 
known  among  English  readers  as  Szegedin,  but 
whose  name  really  was  John  Kiss  of  Szegedin, 
Szegedin  being  his  birthplace.  He,  too,  at  first, 
came  into  contact  with  the  Lutheran  reformation 
and  visited  Wittenberg  in  1543..  He  returned  to 
Szegled  where  he  introduced  Protestantism,  es- 
pecially the  mild  form  of  Lutheranism  known  as 
Melancthonianism.  Compelled  to  flee,  he  was  im- 
prisoned, but  released  and  removed  to  Raczkeve, 
where  he  became  the  head  of  35  congregations.  He 
was  the  most  learned  of  the  Hungarian  reformers, 
being  a  writer  of  poetry,  and  also  of  their  largest 
work  on  theology  produced  in  the  reformation,  his 
"Loci  Communes"  or  Theology,  published  in  1585. 
This  work  is  Calvinistic,  for  like  Devay  he  passed 
from  Lutheranism,  especially  the  mild  form  of  it 
(Melancthonianism),  which  he  imbibed  in  Ger- 
many, over  to  the  Calvinistic  views. 

Still  a  third  reformer  needs  to  be  mentioned, 
Melius.  He,  too,  went  first  to  Wittenberg  in  1556, 
but  by  1559  he  embraced  the  Reformed  doctrines. 
He  had  been  called  the  Calvin  of  Debreczin,  and 
Debreczin  has  been  called  the  Calvinistic  Rome  of 
Hungary,   for  it  has  been  the  centre  of  the  Re- 


368    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

formed  Church  of  Hungary  ever  since  the  reforma- 
tion.* He,  together  with  Szegedin,  prepared  the 
first  Reformed  Confession  of  Hungary  in  1561. 
He  labored  at  Dehreczin  and  led  even  the  young 
king  to  become  Reformed.  Devay  having  died, 
Melius,  together  with  Kalmanesch,  were  the  great 
defenders  of  the  Reformed  against  Lutheranism. 
The  publication  of  the  high  Lutheran  creed,  the 
Formula  of  Concord,  in  1580,  with  its  anathemas 
on  the  Reformed  and  its  narrow  Lutheranism,  com- 
pleted the  breach  of  Hungary  with  the  Lutherans, 
they  were  entirely  too  liberal  to  accept  any  such 
creed  as  that.  Before  that,  many  Hungarians  had 
gone  to  Wittenberg  to  study,  but  now  they  went  to 
Heidelberg.  At  that  time  Socinianism  or  Uni- 
tarianism,  with  its  denial  of  the  divinity  of  Christ, 
caused  great  trouble  in  Poland  and  Transylvania, 
but  the  Reformed  doctrines  were  successfully  de- 
fended by  Melius.  By  the  middle  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  the  Second  Helvetic  Confession  of 
the  Swiss  was  adopted  as  the  creed  of  the  church, 
which  became  known  as  the  "Church  of  the  Hel- 
vetic confession." 


*It  is  located  about  130  miles  east  of  Buda-Pesth. 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pesth.  369 

This  Hungarian  church  had  to  suffer  great  perse- 
cutions and  belongs  to  the  martyr  churches.     But 
fortunately   after    1526  three-fourths  of   Hungary 
was  held  by  the  Turks  until  1686,  their  pasha  re- 
sided at  Buda.     And  the  Turks  were  more  liberal 
in   their   treatment   of    Protestants   than   were   the 
Catholics.      So   Protestantism   flourished   in   south- 
eastern and  eastern  Hungary.     Still  great  were  the 
persecutions  of  the  Reformed.     But  there  arose  a 
brave  defender  for  their  liberties  in  Stephen  Bocs- 
kay,  a  noble,  who  was  able,  June  23,  1606,  to  secure 
the  liberties  of  Hungary  from  the  king.     But  un- 
fortunately he  was  poisoned   December   22,    1606, 
]>v   his   secretary,   who  was   massacred  by  the   in- 
furiated  populace.      He   was  an   excellent   soldier, 
a  wise  diplomat  and  an  humble  Christian.     At  the 
beginning  of  the  Thirty  Years  war,  Ferdinand  II 
was   made   King   of    Hungary.      As    Bocskay   had 
fought  the  first  war  for  the  liberty  of  the  Hunga- 
rians, Bethlen  Gabor  fought  the  second.    Twice  he 
took  up  arms  to  defend  the  Protestants.    He  seems 
to  have  been  a  much  maligned  character  by  Eng- 
lish and  German  historians,  who  speak  of  him  as 
an  uncivilized  boor  and  only  half  a  Christian.    But 
according  to  Hungarian  historians  like  Balogh,  he 


370    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

was  a  great  Christian.  He  was  victorious  44  times. 
He  read  his  Bible  through  26  times  in  his  life-time. 
He  died  in  1629  his  last  words  being  "If  God 
be  for  us  who  can  be  against  us?  No  one!  Cer- 
tainly, no  one."  A  third  war,  however,  was  neces- 
sary before  the  Hungarian  church  gained  its  rights. 
In  this  the  leader  was  George  Rakocsi,  a  wise  and 
energetic  prince  of  great  zeal  and  rare  piety.  His 
motto  was  Romans  9:  16,  "So  then  it  is  not  of  him 
that  willeth,  nor  of  him  that  runneth,  but  of  God 
that  showeth  mercy."  He  so  defeated  Ferdinand 
III,  that  Protestantism  was  given  entire  freedom  by 
1646.     He  died  1648. 

But  later,  Protestantism  had  to  struggle  for  its 
existence.  The  church  of  the  Magyars  had  been 
truly  the  church  of  the  martyrs.  In  the  first  half 
of  the  seventeenth  century,  400  churches  were 
taken  from  them,  though  the  diet  of  1647  caused  90 
to  be  returned.  But  still  there  was  a  great  loss. 
The  Jesuits  in  1674  decided  to  direct  their  fury 
especially  against  the  Protestant  pastors.  They 
seemed  to  have  in  mind  the  Bible  verse,  "I  will 
smite  the  shepherd  and  the  sheep  will  be  scattered." 
In  that  year  the  Catholic  archbishop  cited  250 
Lutheran  ministers  and  95  Reformed  to  appear  be- 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pcsth.  371 

fore  him.  The  number  of  Reformed  is  smaller  be- 
cause many  of  them  were  still  under  Turkish  con- 
trol and  therefore  free  from  such  persecutions. 
Those  who  would  not  deny  their  faith,  were  cast 
into  various  prisons.  Most  of  the  Reformed  were 
quartered  at  Pressburg,  on  the  Danube,  where  they 
were  tempted  to  become  perverts  to  Rome  by  the 
Jesuits.  They  were  cast  into  three  prisons  at 
Leopoldstadt,  Komorn  and  Berensch. 

After  an  imprisonment  of  a  year,  forty-two  were 
sent  on  a  Via  Dolorosa,  truly  a  journey  of  weep- 
ing, to  the  galleys  at  Naples.  As  they  were  gath- 
ered from  these  different  prisons  March  18,  1675, 
for  the  journey,  the  Reformed  superintendent,  in 
meeting  the  others,  declared,  "O  God,  for  what 
times  hast  thou  preserved  us.  Grant  that  we,  sus- 
tained by  thee,  may  overcome  the  sufferings  that 
yet  remain."  Their  journey  lasted  fifty  days. 
Chained  by  both  feet,  they  travelled  to  Trieste  on 
the  Adriatic  Sea.  Here  they  were  robbed  of  their 
clothing  and  so  shaved  in  the  face  and  head,  that 
they  only  knew  each  other  by  their  tone  of  voice. 
Their  daily  fare  was  a  quarter  of  a  biscuit,  with  a 
bit  of  cheese  and  a  glass  of  water.  They  had 
quarters   in  jails   and  filthy  places,   and   so  insuf- 


y]2     famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

ficiently  fed  that  at  Triests  many  became  sick  and 
four  died  in  prison,  while  on  the  journey  two  had 
died  of  their  privations.  They  were  taken  across 
the  Adriatic  sea  to  Pescara,  and  then  marched  over 
Italy  in  the  same  way,  lodged  in  dirty  prisons  until 
they  came  to  Naples,  May  7,  1675,  thirty  in  num- 
ber. There  they  were  sold  to  the  galleys  for  50 
Spanish  piastres  cash,  and  were  chained  to  the 
benches.  The  following  year,  others  were  sent 
thither.  Their  sufferings  in  the  galleys  from  insuf- 
ficient food,  filthy  water  and  terrible  beatings  were 
so  great  that  six  died. 

But  there  happened  to  be  in  Naples  a  wealthy 
merchant,  George  Weltz,  who  aided  them  much 
with  food  and  money  and  who  made  their  condition 
known  to  the  Reformed  churches  in  Europe,  es- 
pecially through  a  physician  at  Venice  named  Zas- 
sius,  who  wrote  letters  about  them  to  Switzerland, 
Germany,  Holland  and  England.  King  Charles  II 
of  England,  caused  a  collection  to  be  taken  up  for 
them  and  the  Elector  of  Saxony  interceded  for 
them,  but  in  vain.  But  in  their  darkest  hour  God 
brought  them  deliverance,  proving  his  promise,  "I 
will  redeem  thee  and  not  forget  mine  own,"  saith 
the  Lord,  "your  Saviour."     On  December  1,  1675, 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pcsth,  373 

the  Dutch  fleet  under  Vice-admiral  Hein,  appeared 
at  Naples,  but,  as  he  was  about  gaining  their  de- 
liverance, he  was  called  away  by  the  French  war. 
However,  in  going  away,  he  met  on  the  way  Ad- 
miral de   Ruyter,  the  Dutch   admiral.     The   latter 
arrived  at  Naples  Feb.   1,   1676,  and  on  February 
11  he  freed  them.     They  sang  Psalms  46,  114  and 
125  as  they  left  the  galleys.     On  the  Dutch  ves- 
sels,  they    were   given    food    and   drink   and   sang 
Psalm  116  as  their  song  of  Thanksgiving  for  free- 
dom after  about  nine  months  imprisonment.     Ad- 
miral de  Ruyter  declared  that  none  of  all  his  vic- 
tories had  given  him  so  much  joy  as  the  deliver- 
ance of  these  servants  of  Christ,  and  at  his  own  ex- 
pense he  clothed  them,  26  in  number.     They  then 
departed,  being  taken  by  an  English  ship  to  Venice. 
They  then  travelled  to  Geneva.     They  also  visited 
Zurich.      For    Switzerland   had    raised   $6,400    for 
them  and  they  desired  to  thank  the  Swiss  who  had 
done  so  much  for  them  when  enslaved.    There  they 
were   cordially   welcomed   and   kept   at   the   public 
expense  and  then  they  went  on  to  Holland.     Half 
of  them  returned  to  Hungary,  but  the  rest  found 
work  elsewhere  principally  in  Holland.    In  memory 
of  these  martyrs,  a  Reformed  church  was  recently 


374    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

erected  at  Pressburg,  on  the  Danube,  where  they 
were  tried.  And  a  monument  has  recently,  through 
the  efforts  of  Rev.  Prof.  Balogh,  been  erected  at 
Debreczin  in  their  memory. 

Later  the  oppressions  of  the  Reformed  continued, 
especially  under  the  Austrian  Empress  Maria  The- 
resa. But  finally  came  the  Edict  of  Toleration  in 
1 781  by  Emperor  Joseph,  which  affected  Hungary 
as  well  as  Bohemia.  This  greatly  aided  their  con- 
dition, although  it  gave  them  only  toleration.  They 
did  not  gain  full  religious  liberty  until  1844.  From 
that  time,  they  have  been  growing  and  more  thor- 
oughly organizing  themselves  so  that  there  is  now  a 
General  Synod,  formed  out  of  the  five  districts  of 
Hungary.  The  church  holds  "the  Second  Helvetic 
Confession  and  the  Heidelberg  Catechism  as  its 
creeds. 

Two  places  are  especially  interesting  in  connec- 
tion with  this  Hungarian  church,  Buda-Pesth  is 
the  most  interesting  to  the  tourist,  but  the  old 
capital  of  the  Reformed  in  Hungary  has  always 
been  Debreczin.  It  is  a  city  of  about  75,000,  and 
lies  in  the  midst  of  a  flat  alluvial  plain,  for  Hun- 
gary is  a  vast  farming  region  like  our  western  prai- 
ries.    The  most  prominent  building  in  the  town  is 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pesth.  375 

the  great  Reformed  church.    There  are  a  number  of 
church-buildings,    belonging   to    this    congregation, 
which  has  a  number  of  pastors  and  a  board  of  near- 
ly a  hundred  elders  in  its   Presbyterium ;   for  in 
Hungary,  as  in  Germany,  the  Presbyterium  is  in 
the  congregation  (composed  of  the  eldership)  and 
not  above  it,  as  in  the   Presbyterian  churches  in 
America.     It  was  quite  significant  that  when  the 
movement  for  liberty  under  Kossuth  in  the  middle 
of  the  nineteenth  century  broke  out  in  Austria,  it 
should  find  its  centre  at  Debreczin.     For  although 
Kossuth  himself  was  a  Lutheran,  yet  his  movement 
was  Reformed  in  principle.     For  has  not  Calvinism 
been  called  the  mother  of  republics  like  Holland  and 
America.     It  was  from  the  pulpit  of  the  Great  Re- 
formed church  at  Debreczin  that  Kossuth,  April  14, 
1849,  read  the  deposition  of  the  Hapsburg  dynasty 
from  the  throne  of   Hungary,  thus   declaring  the 
freedom  of  Hungary  from  Austria.     And  it  was 
in  the  aula  or  hall  of  the  Reformed  University  at 
Debreczin,  that  the  legislature  of  Kossuth  held  its 
sessions.     After  the   defeat  of   Kossuth,  the  Re- 
formed pastor  of  the  Great  Church  at  Debreczin 
was  forbidden  to  exercise  his  ministerial  functions 
for  some  time  as  a  punishment  for  allowing  Kos- 


376    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

suth  to  read  his  proclamation  from  that  pulpit.  Al- 
though the  revolution  of  Kossuth  was  unsuccess- 
ful, yet  it  is  to  be  noticed  that  the  Hungarians  have 
since  gained  by  peace  what  they  then  fought  for  in 
war.  They  have  become  the  stronger  end  of  that 
dual  monarchy  of  Austro-Hungary.  And  in  Hun- 
gary, although  the  Reformed  are  in  the  minority, 
yet  they  have  supplied  many  prominent  public  men 
(out  of  all  proportion  to  the  smallness  of  their 
numbers),  thus,  as  prime  ministers,  the  late  Mr. 
Tizsa  and  Count  Bannffy. 

But  in  Hungary,  it  is  Buda-Pesth  the  capital, 
that  interests  the  traveller,  because  of  its  beauty. 
It  too,  is  becoming  more  and  more  a  Reformed  cen- 
tre as  the  city  grows.  It  has  a  Reformed  univer- 
sity. There  are  five  Reformed  universities  in  Hun- 
gary, at  Debreczin,  Buda-Pesth,  Papa,  Kolosvar  and 
Saros-Patak.  Of  these,  Debreczin  and  Papa  are 
orthodox  and  Calvinistic.  Kolosvar  and  Saros- 
Patak  are  rationalistic  and  Buda-Pesth,  formerly 
rationalistic,  has  been  inclining  to  the  Evangelical 
side.  If  Debreczin  represents  the  past  of  the  Hun- 
garian church,  Buda-Pesth  represents  its  future. 
In  this  rapidly  growing  city  the  Reformed  have 
been  increasing  and  number  30,000,  and  they  are 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pesth.  377 

building  churches  until  they  now  have  at  present 
six,   some  of  them  fine  specimens  of  architecture. 

A  tower  of  strength  in  all  the  forward  movements 
of  the  church  is  Rev.  Mr.  Szabo,  formerly  professor 
of  philosophy  in  the  theological  school  of  Buda- 
Pesth,  but  now  one  of  the  pastors  of  the  Calvin 
church  there.  The  Reformed  church  of  Hungary 
is  peculiar  among  the  other  Reformed  churches  in 
having  bishops,  but  they  are  of  equal  rank  with  the 
other  ministers,  being  only  superintendents.  It  is 
also  peculiar  in  practising  pouring  (affusion)  in 
baptism  instead  of  sprinkling,  which  custom  the 
Reformed  church  of  Bohemia  has  copied  from 
them.  The  Hungarian  church  there  has  2,452,000 
adherents. 

In  1838  there  came  a  new  Protestant  force  into 
Buda-Pesth  to  greatly  aid  the  Evangelicals  in  the 
Hungarian  Church.  This  was  the  establishment  of 
a  mission  to  the  Jews  by  the  Free  Church  of  Scot- 
land.5" It  seems  that  that  church  sent  several  min- 
isters to  Palestine  to  get  information  about  starting 
a  Jewish  mission  there.    On  their  return  home,  one 


*The  Scotch  churches  have  several  successful  mis- 
sions  to  tlie  Jews  on  the  continent  as  at  Hamburg, 
Germany. 


3/8     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

of  them  fell  very  sick  at  Bucla-Pesth.  It  happened 
that  the  Viceroy  of  Hungary  at  that  time  had  a 
Protestant  wife,  who  from  her  palace  on  the  hill- 
top of  Buda  looked  down  on  a  city  sunk  in  Romish 
superstitions  and  prayed  God  to  send  more  light  to 
illuminate  the  people  with  the  Gospel.  She  hap- 
pened to  hear  of  the  illness  of  this  Scotch  mission- 
ary. She  had  him  cared  for  so  that  he  recovered. 
To  these  ministers  she  confided  the  burden  of  her 
heart  as  she  yearned  for  the  spiritual  uplift  of  her 
people.  They  became  so  impressed  that  with  her 
appeal,  that  they  went  home  to  Scotland  to  recom- 
mend the  starting  of  a  mission  to  the  Jews  in  Buda- 
Pesth  instead  of  in  Palestine.  Time  proved  the 
wisdom  of  their  choice,  for  the  Jews  of  Palestine 
have  always  proved  exceedingly  hard  to  reach,  while 
Buda-Pesth  has  proved  an  open  door  of  entrance 
to  Israel. 

Out  of  this  Jewish  mission  have  come  some  con- 
verts who  have  become  famous  in  the  church. 
Hardly  had  the  mission  been  opened  when  a  little 
boy,   Adolph    Saphir,*   created   a   sensation   in   his 


*See  my  "Famous  Missionaries  of  the  Reformed 
Church,"  for  a  fuller  account  of  this  Mission  to  the 
Jews. 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pesth.  379 

Jewish  home  by  saying  grace  at  the  table  in  the 
name  of  Jesus.  He  had  been  a  pupil  in  the  school 
of  the  mission.  The  result  was  that  both  he  and 
his  father  joined  the  Christians.  But  how  could 
they  be  received  into  the  Protestant  church.  The 
Austrian  law  did  not  recognize  the  Presbyterian 
church  as  it  was  a  foreign  (Scotch)  church.  So 
these  converts  united  with  its  sister-church  of  the 
same  ecclesiastical  family,  the  Reformed  Church  of 
Hungary,  a  church  which  was  recognized  by  law 
in  Hungary.  They  were  confirmed  by  Rev.  Mr. 
Torok,  the  Reformed  superintendent  at  Buda- 
Pesth.  This  boy  afterward  became  one  of  the  most 
prominent  of  the  Presbyterian  ministers  in  London. 
Another  very  prominent  convert  was  Alfred  Eder- 
sheim,  whose  tutor,  though  a  Jew,  left  him  in  the 
care  of  this  mission.  He  soon  found  Jesus  as  the 
fulfillment  of  the  Jewish  hopes  and  was  also  bap- 
tized in  the  Reformed  church  at  Buda-Pesth.  Af- 
terwards he  went  to  England  and  joined  the  Epis- 
copal church.  He  was  probably  the  only  Hebrew- 
Christian  ever  asked  by  Dean  Stanley  to  preach 
in  Westminster  Abbey.  He  became  the  author  of 
the  best  and  most  scholarly  Life  of  Christ  in  the 
English   language.      It  was   a  noble   tribute   of   a 


380    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

converted  Jew  to  "Jesus  the  Jew,"  and  in  it  he  uses 
all  his  peculiar  Jewish  genius  to  prove  that  Jesus 
was  the  Messiah  expected  of  the  Jews.  What 
Matthew  was  among  the  first  Evangelists  the  He- 
brew-Christian writer,  that  Edersheim  has  been  in 
our  day  among  the  writers  of  the  lives  of  Christ. 

Another  of  the  converts  of  this  Jewish  mission 
was  a  man,  less  widely  known  in  America,  but  de- 
stined to  exert  a  wide  influence  for  Christianity 
in  Jewish  evangelization,  Rev.  Mr.  Schonberger. 
For  it  was  he,  who  converted  Rev.  Mr.  Venetianer 
from  Judaism,  and  the  latter,  about  twenty  years 
ago,  became  pastor  of  a  Reformed  church  near 
Odessa  in  southern  Russia.  It  happened  that  just 
at  that  time  a  Jewish  rabbi  named  Rabinowitsch 
had  been  preaching  about  our  "brother  Jesus."  Al- 
though Rabinowitsch  was  baptized  in  Berlin,  yet 
when  he  wanted  the  members  of  his  synagogue, 
who  became  Christians,  to  be  baptized,  he  turned 
to  Mr.  Venetianer,  who  was  in  the  neighborhood 
and  the  latter  baptized  his  synagogue  and  made  its 
members  Christian,  thus  starting  a  new  movement 
among  the  Jews  of  Russia  toward  Christianity. 

This  Presbyterian  mission  to  the  Jews  at  Buda- 
Pesth  has  thus  not  merely  brought  converts  into 


Hungary,  Picturesque  Buda-Pesth.  381 

the  Reformed  church  of  Hungary,  but  it  has  also 
considerably  influenced  the  thought  and  work  of 
that  church.  It  has  strengthened  the  Evangelical 
part  of  that  church  and  has  acquainted  them  with 
the  aggressive  practical  movements  of  the  western 
Anglo-saxon  churches.  It  has  also  led  to  the  form- 
ation of  a  German  church  at  Buda-Pesth  of  over 
1,200  adherents.  As  a  result  of  this  contact  with 
the  Scotch  Mission,  the  Reformed  church  at  Buda- 
Pesth  has  become  more  aggressive  and  practical  and 
the  Young  Men's  Christian  Association  and  Chris- 
tian Endeavor  movements  have  entered  there  with 
power.  A  Sunday  evening  prayer-meeting  has 
been  held  for  a  number  of  years  by  the  Hungarians 
there,  the  writer*  having  had  the  privilege  of  speak- 
ing on  one  occasion  to  them.  This  Hungarian 
Church,  if  revived  by  God's  Spirit,  and  filled  with 
Evangelical  and  evangelistic  zeal,  will  be  a  mighty 
power  for  the  evangelization  of  southeastern  Eu- 
rope. 


s& 


Chapter    VI.— BOHEMIA,    HUSS    AND 
PRAGUE. 

BOHEMIA  was  the  last  country  in  Europe  to 
submit  to  the  yoke  of  Rome  and  the  first 
to  attempt  to  throw  it  off  under  Huss.  It 
has  over  six  millions  of  inhabitants.  Its  capital, 
Prague,  "the  hundred-towered,  golden  Praque,"  is 
most  picturesquely  located  on  both  sides  of  the 
Moldau  river.  It  is  sometimes  called  "the  city  of 
a  hundred  spires"  and  is  an  ancient  city,  for  it 
contains  the  monuments  and  trophies  of  nearly  a 
thousand  years.  Its  population,  including  the  sub- 
urbs, is  about  400,000.  Its  ancient  buildings  find 
their  crown  and  climax  in  the  Hradschin,  the  cita- 
del on  the  west  side  of  the  river,  in  which  is  the 
cathedral  and  the  palace. 

Prague  is  very  interesting  because  of  its  religious 
history.  One  of  its  prominent  buildings  is  the 
Teyn  church,  the  church  that  for  more  than  two 
hundred  year.-,  was  the  church  of  the  Hussites.  It 
has  two  towers  each  crowned  by  graceful  turrets. 
The  old  Bohemian  church  used  to  have  as  its  sym- 
bol the  cup  and  the  book,  because  those  were  the 
two  things  that  the  Hussites  demanded  from  the 
383 


384     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Romish  church, — the  use  of  the  Bible  and  also  of 
the  wine  at  the  Lord's  Supper.  The  old  Bohemians 
demanded  this,  because  they  had  had  it  originally. 
For  before  they  became  Catholics,  they  had  be- 
longed to  the  Greek  Church,  which  allowed  such 
things  to  its  members.  This  old  Teyn  church  used 
to  have  on  its  front  a  gigantic  cup  and  beneath  it 
the  statue  of  one  of  the  Hussite  kings,  George 
Podiebrad.  But  when  the  Catholics  gained  con- 
trol of  Bohemia  (1622)  they  took  it  down  and  put 
in  its  place  a  statue  of  the  virgin  and  now  use  the 
church  for  their  services. 

The  Protestant  history  of  Prague  begins  with 
John  Huss,  one  of  the  reformers  before  the  ref- 
ormation. John  Huss  was  born  in  1369  at  Husinec, 
and  attended  the  University  of  Prague  (1393-6). 
In  1402  he  became  curate  of  the  Bethlehem  chapel 
at  Prague  and  began  that  popular  style  of  preach- 
ing, which  so  stirred  the  hearts  of  the  Bohemians 
to  new  life.*  Wycklif's  works  were  burned  in  the 
court  of  the  palace  of  the  archbishop  in  the  Hrad- 
schin  in  1410.     But  Huss,  who  followed  Wycklif, 


*The  site  of  the  Bethlehem  chapel  is  still  shown  in 
the  Bethlehem's  Platz  and  his  house  was  No.  7,  Beth- 
lehem's Platz. 


Bohemia,  Huss  and  Prague.  385 

and  the  papists  came  into  conflict.  In  1414  he  was 
summoned  to  appear  he  fore  the  Council  at  Con- 
stance, having  been  given  a  safe  conduct  by  the 
Emperor  Sigismund.  But  the  safe  conduct  was 
violated,  for  he  was  thrown  into  prison  and  pub- 
licly burned  at  the  stake  there  on  July  6,  141 5,  as 
was  his  young  follower,  Jerome  of  Prague,  the  year 
later. 

John  Huss  was  put  to  death,  but  he  still  lived  in 
the  hearts  of  his  people.  Bohemia  was  filled  with 
his  doctrines  and  the  Bohemians  rushed  to  war 
for  their  rights.  They  divided  into  two  parties,  the 
Calixtines  or  Utraquists  (who  were  concessive  to 
the  Catholics),*  and  the  Taborites,  later  the  Breth- 
ren, who  were  more  radical  in  their  reforms  of 
Catholicism.  The  Taborites  produced  a  great  gen- 
eral named  Ziska,  at  first  blind  in  one  eye,  then 
perfectly  blind;  but,  who  in  spite  of  his  blindness, 
was  never  defeated  and,  though  blind,  defeated  his 
enemies.  For  safety  the  Taborites  built  the  town 
of  Tabor  about  fifty  miles  south  of  Prague  (1420) 
on  the  top  of  a  hill  and  made  it  practically  impreg- 


*They    gradually    conformed    to    the    Catholic    cere- 
monies,  only  retaining  the  communion  in  two  kinds. 


386    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

nable.  As  long  as  Ziska  lived,  it  never  was  taken, 
but  after  bis  deatb  it  was  captured  and  is  mainly 
Catbolic,  although  there  is  a  Bohemian  Reformed 
church  there  now.  A  monument  to  Ziska  is  on  the 
slope  of  its  Ringplatz.  He  is  represented  with  his 
helmet  on  his  bent  head,  with  a  heavy  mustache 
over  his  plate  armor,  a  shirt  of  mail,  a  terrible 
morning-star  in  his  right  hand  and  a  great  sword 
in  his  left.  In  the  large  open  Ringplatz  were 
placed  twenty  or  thirty  stone  tables  (one  of  them 
still  remains  and  looks  like  a  low  bench)  at  which 
the  Hussites  celebrated  their  communion.  Tabor 
is  still  a  very  interesting  place,  so  interesting  from 
a  military  point  of  view  that  army  officers,  espe- 
cially Austrians,  still  come  to  it  and  marvel  at  its 
fortifications.  Ziska's  soldiers  were  often  armed 
with  flails  and  they  were  so  victorious  that  their 
enemies  became  very  much  afraid  of  their  flailings. 
Ziska  led  his  troops  to  battle  singing  the  Hussite 
war  song,  "Ye  warriors  of  the  Lord  our  God," 
which  struck  terror  into  the  hearts  of  the  enemy. 
A  strange  fact  about  Tabor  at  present  is,  that  it 
has  a  fine  city  museum,  which  is  filled  with  curiosi- 
ties of  the  Hussites,  for  they  had  nothing  else  to 
fill  it  with,  as  the  only  history  of  the  town  was 


Bohemia,  Huss  and  Prague.  387 

Hussite.  And  yet  all  its  directors  are  Catholics  ex- 
cept one,  the  pastor  of  the  Reformed  church  there. 

But  after  Ziska's  death  the  Hussites  had  to  un- 
dergo many  persecutions.  Many  were  put  to  death 
or  driven  out  of  the  country.  Perhaps  the  most 
awful  was  the  persecution  at  Kuttenberg,  famous 
for  its  silver  mines,  located  about  forty  miles  south- 
east of  Prague.  Here,  in  1419,  the  miners,  who 
were  mainly  bigoted  Catholics,  persecuted  the 
Hussites  severely.  A  reward  of  15  dollars  having 
been  offered  for  each  lay-Hussite  and  75  dollars 
for  each  minister,  a  man-hunt  was  organized  and 
many  were  captured.  They  were  lashed  in  gangs 
and  pushed  over  the  edge  of  a  mine,  dragging 
others  with  them  as  they  fell,  until  their  bruised 
corpses  lay  in  a  heap  at  the  pit's  bottom.  One  of 
the  mines  at  Kuttenberg,  the  St.  Martin's,  about 
300  feet  deep,  had  5,496  hurled  down  into  it. 

Thus  John  Huss  lived  in  the  Hussite  movement, 
especially  in  the  stricter  Taborites  or  Brethren. 
The  Catholic  church,  however,  found  that  John 
Huss  had  become  a  national  idol  of  the  Bohemians 
and  so  they  tried  to  displace  him  by  introducing 
another  saint,  a  new  one,  St.  John  of  Nepomuc. 
This  is  the  legend  they  got  up  to  make  him  the 


388    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

saint  over  against  John  Huss.  When  King  Wen- 
zel  IV,  of  Bohemia,  in  1383  commanded  John  of 
Nepomuc,  who  was  a  priest,  to  betray  the  secret 
of  the  confessional  he  refused-.  For  this  he  was 
thrown  from  the  Charles-bridge  (Carlsbriicke)  at 
Prague  into  the  rapid  waters  of  the  river  Moldau. 
His  body,  says  their  tradition,  in  spite  of  the  cur- 
rents, floated  under  the  arch  of  the  bridge  with 
five  brilliant  stars  hovering  over  his  head.  For 
this  faithfulness  to  the  Romish  confessional,  he 
has  been  made  the  Catholic  saint  of  Bohemia.  But 
the  Catholics  have  never  been  able  by  this  legend 
to  displace  John  Huss  in  the  affections  of  the  Bo- 
hemians. Indeed  many  a  statue  of  John  of  Nepo- 
muc is  only  John  Huss's  statue  with  a  halo  and 
five  stars  about  his  head.  The  Catholics  with  all 
their  wiles  have  not  been  able  to  draw  the  affections 
of  the  Bohemians  as  a  race  from  John  Huss. 
Though  the  most  of  them  are  Catholics  in  reli- 
gion they  are  Hussites  politically. 

Although  John  Huss  lived  before  the  Reformed 
Church  was  founded,  yet  we  have  placed  him  here, 
because  his  life  is  the  key  to  the  religious  history 
of  Bohemia.  And,  indeed,  we  believe  that  if  he 
had  lived  in  reformation  times  he  would  have  joined 


Bohemia,  Httss  and  Prague.  389 

the  Reformed,  for  he  was  a  believer  in  predestina- 
tion.* But  in  the  reformation,  the  Hussites  were 
at  first  especially  drawn  to  Luther.  This  was  nat- 
ural as  Luther's  reformation  was  near  to  them, 
while  the  Reformed  were  far  away.  They  rejoiced 
to  find  that  a  successor  of  John  Huss,  of  whom 
Huss  had  prophesied,  had  now  arisen  in  Luther. 
Their  students  began  going  to  Wittenberg  to  study. 
But  gradually  the  Brethren  began  to  be  dissatisfied 
with  Luther  and  his  reformation,  especially  because 
of  their  lack  of  church  discipline,  on  which  the 
Brethren  laid  particular  stress.  As  a  result  they 
began  to  incline  more  and  more  toward  the  Re- 
formed as  they  learned  to  know  more  about  them. 
They  were  especially  pleased  with  the  importance 
that  Bncer  and  Calvin  laid  on  church-discipline. 
Hence  their  students  later  attended  the  Reformed 
universities  as  Heidelberg  and  Geneva.  The  sim- 
plicity of  the  Reformed  worship  also  appealed  to. 
them  more  than  the  Lutheran  mode  of  worship  with 
its  altars  and  crucifixes.  But  they  never  joined  the 
Reformed  church  as  did  the  Waldenses.  Indeed 
they    dared    not    join    any    foreign    church;     for 


*See   "Alte  und  Neue   Bohmische   Briider,"  Vol.   Ill; 
Kurtz  also  grants  this  point. 


390    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

even  for  coming  into  friendly  relations  with  for- 
eign churches  like  the  Lutheran  and  Reformed,  they 
had  to  endure  religious  persecutions. 

There  came  a  time,  however,  when  the  Hussites 
came  into  direct  contact  with  the  Reformed  Church. 
This  occurred  when  in  1619,  the  Bohemians,  after 
throwing  the  two  royal  councilors  out  of  a  window 
of  the  palace  at  Prague,  into  a  garden  fifty  feet 
below,  where  they  escaped  death  by  falling  on  a 
dung-heap,  elected  Elector  Frederick  V  of  the 
Palatinate,  as  their  king.  He  was  only  twenty- 
four  years  of  age,  but  then  he  was  the  son-in-law 
of  the  King  of  England,  James  I.  He  accepted 
and  entered  Prague  in  pomp  October  21,  1619.  He 
introduced  Reformed  worship  in  Prague  alongside 
of  the  Hussite  worship.  Frederick's  court  preacher, 
Scultetus,  cleansed  the  cathedral  at  Prague  of  its 
Catholic  crucifixes,  altars,  pictures  and  statues.  Plis 
puritanic  reforms  were  so  radical  as  to  cause  op- 
position. He  wanted  also  to  put  away  the  great 
crucifix  on  the  Carls-brucke,  which  had  been  sacred 
to  the  Bohemians  for  centuries, — a  sort  of  national 
emblem,   but  he  was  prevented.*     But  Frederick 


*A  carved  wooden  board  in  the  chapel  of  St.  Wences- 
laus  shows  Scidtetus  cleansing  the  cathedral. 


Bohemia,  Huss  and  Prague.  391 

reigned  only  about  a  year  and  was  named  the  "Win- 
ter-king." For  his  rival  to  the  Bohemian  throne 
and  also  his  emperor,  Ferdinand,  marched  an  army 
against  him.  They  met  in  decisive  battle  November 
8,  1620,  at  the  White  Mountain,  a  few  miles  west  of 
Prague.  Frederick  with  his  family  was  compelled 
to  flee.*  With  Frederick  fell  the  Reformed  church 
of  all  that  region. 

On  June  21,  1621,  occurred  the  final  tragedy  of 
that  defeat  of  the  White  Mountain.  In  front  of 
the  city  hall  at  Prague  at  5  A.  M.,  twenty-seven  of 
the  leading  Protestants  of  Bohemia  were  led  out 
and  beheaded.  Some  were  Hussites,  others  Luth- 
erans, others  Reformed.  They  had  spent  the  night 
in  exhortation  and  prayer.  Relying  on  Psalm  86: 
17  "Thou  wilt  show  me  a  token  of  good,"  they  had 
prayed  that  God  would  give  them  some  sign  that 
they  had  not  displeased  him.  To  their  great  joy, 
as  the  sun  rose,  a  most  beautiful  rainbow  appeared. 
Some  fell  on  their  knees,  some  clapped  their  hands 
and  some  shouted  for  joy.  One  bade  them  think  of 
Noah's   rainbow,   another   of  the   rainbow   of  the 


^Frederick's  flight  over  the  bridge  and  through  the 
streets  of  Frague  is  represented  in  a  quaint  wood  carv- 
ing in  the  cathedral  at  Prague. 


392    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

book  of  Revelations  around  God's  throne  as  the 
sure  sign  of  the  Lord's  coming  to  judge  the  quick 
and  the  dead.  The  heads  and  hands  of  twelve  of 
them  were  nailed  on  the  east  tower  of  the  Carls- 
briicke  at  Prague  as  a  warning  to  all  Protestant 
heretics.  For  ten  years  those  ghastly  weather- 
beaten  bones  hung  on  that  tower  until  the  Saxon 
army  captured  Prague  in  1632  and  reverently  took 
them  down.  Strange  to  say  the  sword  which  was 
used  to  cut  off  the  heads  of  those  martyrs  turned 
up  257  years  later  (1878)  in  distant  Edinburgh. 
On  it  was  found  engraved,  the  names  of  the  victims 
and  on  the  hilt  the  initials  of  the  executioner. 

And  now  began  a  reign  of  terror  in  Bohemia — a 
killing  time.  The  Emperor  Ferdinand  ordered  all 
to  become  Catholics  or  leave  the  country.  Thirty 
thousand  of  the  best  families  left  the  country  and 
found  homes  elsewhere  mainly  in  Prussia.  The 
population  of  which,  in  1618,  only  one-fortieth  was 
Catholic,  was  reduced  from  three  million  to  one 
hundred  thousand.  As  the  Protestant  pastors  left, 
the  Catholic  priests  came  in,  especially  the  Jesuits, 
those  great  missionaries  of  the  Catholic  Church. 
The  Protestant  churches  were  changed  to  Catholic. 
The   Protestants  were  driven  to  Catholic  worship 


Bohemia,  Hitss  and  Prague.  393 

and  their  children  were  forced  to  Catholic  schools. 
None  but  Catholic  baptisms  or  marriages  were  rec- 
ognized. The  Catholics  took  away  the  Bibles  and 
burned  the  Protestant  books.  One  Jesuit  boasted 
that  with  his  own  hand  he  had  burned  60,000  Prot- 
ectant books.  To  preserve  their  Bibles,  they  hid 
them  in  coffins  and  in  hollow  trees;  yes,  in  the 
sheets  of  mothers  lying  in  child-birth.  A  number 
of  baked  Bibles  have  come  down  to  our  time. 
These  Bibles,  when  the  Catholic  officials  came  to 
the  house,  the  Protestants  put  into  the  dough  of  a 
loaf  of  bread  and  thrust  it  into  the  oven  for  bak- 
ing. In  that  way  the  book  was  preserved,  though 
like  Daniel,  it  often  came  out  of  a  fiery  furnace. 
The  loss  of  a  Bible,  says  Dusek,  one  of  their  present 
ministers,  was  counted  one  of  their  heaviest  af- 
flictions, because  as  there  were  no  Protestant  min- 
isters, their  Bibles  were  their  only  comforters.  No 
one  needed  to  pay  bills  to  Protestants  and  there 
was  no  place  to  bury  them,  as  their  bodies  were 
not  permitted  in  the  graveyards.  Perhaps  the  most 
awful  story  of  their  dragonades  was  when  the 
soldiers  made  all  manners  of  noises  at  the  birth  of 
a  Protestant  child  so  as  to  torment  the  mother ; 
or    when,    having    bound    her    to    a    stake,    they 


394    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

laid  her  babe  at  her  feet,  refusing  to  give  it  to  her 
(though  its  cries  for  food  must  have  almost  broken 
her  mother-heart)  unless  she  became  a  Catholic  and 
had  it  baptized  a  Catholic.  The  extirpation  of 
Protestantism  was  pursued  with  as  much  keenness 
as  the  extirpation  of  wolves  in  England,  in  the  days 
of  the  Tudors.  Each  Jesuit's  fame  depended  on 
the  number  of  his  converts. 

Such  were  the  awful  persecutions  for  a  century 
and  a  half.  Comenius,  the  great  educator  of  the 
Brethren,  was  driven  out  (1627).  A  party  of  the 
Moravians,  driven  out,  settled  in  a  part  of  Saxony, 
where  Count  Zinzendorf  gave  them  an  asylum. 
They  there  accepted  his  creed,  the  Augsburg  Con- 
fession and  he  in  turn  accepted  their  faith  and  be- 
came the  regenerator  of  the  Moravians.  Their  new 
founder  impressed  on  them  a  somewhat  new  char- 
acter as  in  pietism  and  missions.* 


*The  Hussites  in  Germany  split  into  several  parties. 
The  first  was  the  Moravians  of  Zinzendorf's  land. 
These,  by  having  lived  so  long  in  Germany,  have  be- 
come more  German  than  Bohemian  in  type,  and  do  not 
represent  the  old  Bohemian  spirit.  The  second  party 
in  Germany  became  Reformed  as  in  Poland,  Silesia 
and  eastern  Germany,  where  a  number  of  Reformed 
churches  are  made  up  of  these  former  Hussites.     The 


Bohemia,  Hitss  and  Prague.  395 

Such  was  the  night  of  darkness  that  hung  over 
Bohemia  until  the  Edict  of  Toleration,  October  13, 
1781,  by  Emperor  Joseph  II.  It  was  supposed  that 
Protestantism  had  been  entirely  suppressed  in  Bo- 
hemia, certainly  the  severity  and  length  of  the  per- 
secutions were  enough  to  have  entirely  destroyed  it. 
And  yet  when  the  Edict  of  Toleration  was  issued, 
a  wonderful  event  occurred.  Thousands  of  secret 
Protestants  appeared.  Within  two  years  90,000 
left  the  church  of  Rome,  66,000  of  whom  became 
Reformed.  The  Protestant  church  of  Bohemia, 
like  her  Lord,  had  a  resurrection,  and  by  the  end  of 
1783  thirty-three  congregations  had  been  already 
organized. 

A  touching  story  is  told  of  Bishop  Haj  of  Konig- 
gratz,  to  whom  a  peasant  came  to  ask  back  the 
Bible  taken  from  him  years  before.  The  bishop, 
greatly  touched  by  the  peasant's  conversation,  not 
only  gave  him  back  his  Bible,  but  asked  for  his 
blessing.  The  peasant,  laying  his  hands  on  the 
bishop's  head,  besought  that  God  would  give  him 
all  the  gifts  of  the  Holy  Ghost.    The  bishop  declar- 


tliird  consists  of  a  number  of  congregations  in  Ger- 
many that  became  neither  Reformed  nor  Lutheran 
nor  Moravian,  but  remained  simply  Hussites. 


396    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

ed  he  was  more  greatly  moved  by  this  than  even  by 
his  ordination. 

At  the  Edict  of  Toleration,  Emperor  Joseph  II 
stipulated  that  those  who  became  Protestants  must 
become  either  Lutheran  or  Reformed.  Having 
been  without  ministers,  for  so  long,  the  Protestants 
had  to  look  to  other  denominations  for  ministers. 
At  first  Lutheran  ministers  came  among  them,  but 
their  priestly  manners  and  their  crucifixes  and  or- 
nate form  of  service  did  not  suit  the  taste  of  these 
simple-hearted  peasants,  who  wanted  no  relics  of 
Catholicism.  A  few  Reformed  ministers  came 
over  from  Hungary,  hut  they  had  great  difficulty 
with  the  language,  for  there  was  as  great  a  differ- 
ence between  the  Bohemian  and  the  Hungarian  lan- 
guages as  between  the  French  and  the  German. 
Their  method  of  preparing  their  sermons  was  at 
first  very  laborious  and  unsatisfactory.  They  would 
prepare  their  sermons  in  Latin  and  then  by  means 
of  a  Latin-Bohemian  dictionary  translate  them  into 
Bohemian.  But  the  Bohemians  were  so  hungry  for 
Gospel  truth,  that  they  were  glad  to  get  it  even  by 
that  sort  of  preaching.  And  of  course  in  a  few 
years  these  Hungarians  became  proficient  in  Bo- 
hemian and  began  raising  up  a  native   Bohemian 


Bohemia,  Hitss  and  Prague.  397 

ministry.  But  the  Bohemian  Reformed  church  has 
never  forgotten  this  self-sacrifice  of  these  early 
Hungarian  pastors.  A  number  of  their  descendents 
are  now  in  the  ministry  and  are  highly  honored  for 
their  father's  sake.  They  are  spoken  of  as  "of  the 
House  of  Aaron,"  as  Szalatney,  Nagy  and  others. 
As  the  result  of  this  work  of  these  early  pastors, 
three-fourths  of  the  Bohemians,  who  became  Prot- 
estant, entered  the  Reformed  church,  the  rest  be- 
coming Lutheran. 

Since  the  Edict  of  Toleration  the  growth  of  the 
Reformed  in  Bohemia  has  been  slow  but  steady. 
They  had  gotten  only  toleration  not  religious  lib- 
erty and  labored  under  many  disadvantages.  At 
first  they  were  refused  the  right  of  burial  or  the 
right  to  have  schools,  but  progress  in  these  direc- 
tions has  been  made,  although  much  yet  remains  to 
be  done.  For  Catholic  hymns  and  prayers  are  still 
used  in  the  schools,  which  many  of  the  Protestants 
have  to  attend.  The  whole  school  system  is  permea- 
ted with  Catholicism.  When  we  were  in  Prague,  at- 
tending the  Reformed  Conference  in  the  summer  of 
1906,  we  found  that  Protestants  were  still  compelled 
to  take  off  their  hats  when  the  Pyx  was  carried 
through   the   streets.     If  the   Edict   of  Toleration 


398     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

brought  toleration  in  1781,  a  further  step  was 
gained  in  1849,  when  Protestants  were  given  civil 
equality  with  the  Catholics.  This  led  to  greater 
progress  on  the  part  of  the  Protestants.  Before, 
under  toleration,  only  two  new  congregations  had 
been  added  to  the  fifty-five  at  the  beginning  of  the 
nineteenth  century.  Since  1851,  thirty  congrega- 
tions have  been  added,  together  with  fourteen  filial 
congregations. 

In  1866  occurred  a  very  significant  event  in  the 
history  of  Europe.  Prussia  defeated  Austria  and 
transferred  the  balance  of  power  in  Germany  from 
Catholic  Austria  to  Protestant  Prussia,  which  has 
since  raised  herself  to  be  the  head  of  the  great 
German  empire.  Thus  Catholicism  lost  its  control- 
ling power  in  Germany  for  which  she  had  fought 
for  more  than  three  centuries.  And  where  did  that 
defeat  of  Catholicism  take  place?  Ah,  here  is  one 
of  the  strange  revenges  of  history.  Just  as  in 
France  where  Sedan  and  Metz  (former  Reformed 
strongholds,  but  where  the  Reformed  had  been 
driven  out)  marked  the  place  of  France's  defeats, 
so  here,  right  in  Bohemia,  at  Sadowa,  the  seat  of 
her  greatest  persecutions,  Protestantism  gained  her 
great  victory  and  broke  the  Catholic  power.  Among 


Bohemia,  Huss  and  Prague.  399 

the  soldiers  who  fought  Austria,  were  many  de- 
scendents  of  Bohemians,  who  had  been  driven  out 
of  their  land.  They  were  "Daniels  come  to  judg- 
ment." And  it  is  said  a  Protestant  church  sprung 
up  at  Sadowa  from  the  tombstone  of  a  Protestant, 
whose  family  had  inscribed  on  it  some  Bible  pas- 
sages. 

To-day  there  is  in  Bohemia,  one  of  the  most 
Evangelical  of  the  Reformed  churches  on  the  con- 
tinent. Formerly  there  was  some  rationalism  among 
its  ministry  but  there  is  none  now.  She  has  adopt- 
ed the  Heidelberg  Catechism.  She  now  numbers 
87  congregations  and  120,000  adherents.  In 
Prague,  there  are  now  two  Reformed  churches,  St. 
Clements,  of  which  Rev.  Mr.  Soucek  is  pastor. 
Over  the  pulpit  of  this  St.  Clement's  church  is  the 
Hussite  emblem  of  the  cup  and  the  book,  referring 
to  the  use  of  the  Bible  and  the  wine  at  the  Lord's 
Supper,  which  were  the  points  claimed  by  the  Huss- 
ites. The  other  church  is  in  the  Crown  street  of 
the  Royal  Vineyard,  a  suburb  of  Prague.  Much 
of  the  money  raised  by  the  Presbyterian  and  Re- 
formed Alliance  between  1880-90  went  into  this 
church,  as  the  pastor  of  the  St.  Clement's  church 
was  at  that  time  a  rationalist ;  so  that  there  might 


400    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

be  one  Evangelical  Reformed  church  in  Prague. 
But  since  that  time  the  rationalist  has  died,  and 
all  the  Reformed  ministers  in  the  denomination 
are  now  Evangelical. 

One  of  the  early  pastors  of  the  St.  Clement's 
church  was  named  Kossuth.  Under  him  the 
church  grew  so  rapidly  so  that  in  five  years  be- 
tween eight  and  nine  hundred  had  left  the  Cath- 
olic church.  For  his  activity  he  was  arrested 
and  imprisoned  in  the  Hradschin  in  1852,  for 
about  a  year,  and  then  compelled  to  go  into 
exile  in  Germany.  If  this  noble  church  of  the 
martyrs,  which  in  spirit  as  Bohemian  nobly  repre- 
sents the  old  Hussite  movement,  were  better  sup- 
ported by  the  larger,  richer  Reformed  churches,  she 
would  be  able  to  do  a  far  greater  work.  She  espe- 
cially needs  assistance  financially  and  educationally. 
She  needs  a  theological  seminary  for  the  training 
of  ministers,  her  university  being  far  away  at 
Vienna.  And  for  years  there  has  been  no  Reform- 
ed professor  of  theology  at  this  university.* 

Thus  there  are  many   sacred  places  in  Prague. 


*There  is  a  Free  Reformed  church  in  Bohemia  found- 
ed by  the  American  Board,  but  it  is  Congregational, 
not   Presbyterian   and   Reformed. 


Bohemia,  Huss  and  Prague.  401 

The  memorials  of  the  Hussites  are  the  Bethlehem 
Platz  and  Huss  house,  the  Teyn  church  and  the 
picture  of  Huss  before  the  council  at  Constance  in 
the  city  hall ;  also  the  place  in  front  of  the  city 
hall  where  the  martyrs  were  put  to  death  in  1621, 
— the  east  tower  of  the  Charles-bridge,  where  their 
heads  and  hands  were  nailed.  One  of  the  most  in- 
teresting places  is  the  splendid  Bohemian  Museum 
in  which  there  is  a  magnificent  collection  of  manu- 
scripts and  books  of  Huss,  Ziska,  Comenius  and 
others.  We  were  quite  surprised  at  the  art  dis- 
played by  the  Hussites  as  we  had  supposed  them  a 
plain  country-folk.  They  evidently  were  of  the 
best  classes  of  society.  The  cathedral  and  palace 
at  the  Hradschin  where  the  Winter-king  lived,  are 
worth  a  visit,  a-  i-  also  the  Deer  park,  west  of 
Prague,  in  which  is  the  castle,  shaped  like  a  six- 
rayed  star,  from  which  a  fine  view  can  lie  had  over 
the  battle  field  of  White  Mountain.  A  visit  to 
Tabor  and  Kuttenberg  repays  the  time  taken  for  it. 


Chapter  VII.— ENGLAND,  WALES  AND  IRE- 
LAND. 

THERE  are  sacred  places  in  the  British  Isles 
as  well  as  on  the  Continent  of  Europe. 
The  doctrines  of  Calvin  gained  great  in- 
fluence there,  conquering  large  parts  of  them.  Even 
before  the  reformation,  in  the  early  history  of 
Christianity  there,  British  Christianity  was  simpler, 
more  spiritual  and  evangelistic  than  the  Romish 
type  of  Christianity,  as  was  shown  by  the  Culdees 
and  Columba  at  Oban  in  Scotland  and  Patrick  in 
Ireland.  These  British  races  were  liberty-loving 
by  nature  and  were  thus  prepared  ultimately  to  rise 
against  the  despotism  of  Rome.  Wicklif,  the  morn- 
ing star  of  the  reformation,  might  be  called  Re- 
formed in  his  emphasis  on  the  Bible  as  the  rule  of 
faith,  which  was  the  great  peculiarity  of  the  doc- 
trines of  the  Reformed  churches.  If  so,  then  Ox- 
ford, where  he  taught,  and  Lutterworth,  where  he 
was  buried,  become  sacred  places. 

But  it  was  in  the  days  of  the  reformation  that 

the  doctrines  of  the  Reformed  gained  power  there. 

Indeed,  so  great  was  its  power,  that  the  Episcopal 

or  Anglican  Church  of  England  received  the  name, 

403 


404     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

"The  Reformed  Church  of  England,"  which  is  even 
to  this  day  its  legal  name,  though  discounted  as 
much  as  possible  by  its  ritualists,  as  the  name  is  a 
perpetual  protest  against  Catholicism.  The  refor- 
mation in  England  produced  few  leading  theolog- 
ians, as  it  was  at  first  political  rather  than  reli- 
gious, so  prominent  continental  theologians  were 
invited  to  England,  as  Pucer  to  Cambridge,  and 
Peter  Martyr  to  Oxford.  These  in  their  contro- 
versies for  low-church  views  of  doctrine  and  of 
rites  prepared  the  way  for  the  future  influence  of 
the  Reformed.  Cranmer,  though  he  came  first  into 
association  with  Lutheranism  in  Germany,  even 
marrying  the  niece  of  Osiander,  yet  became  a  Cal- 
vinist  in  his  doctrine  of  the  sacraments.  And  Rid- 
ley and  Hooper  with  him  were  Calvinists  in  their 
views.  When  the  Forty-two  Articles  of  Faith,  the 
original  of  the  present  creed  of  the  Church  of 
England,  the  Thirty-nine  Articles,  was  adopted,  it 
was  Calvinistic,  not  only  on  the  sacraments  but 
also  on  election,  which  it  mentions,  though  it  does 
not  refer  to  reprobation.  Put  Cranmer  and  Rid- 
ley and  Latimer,  were  burned  at  Oxford  by  Ploody 
Queen  Mary,  1556.  Though  they  were  Episco- 
palians  in   their  views   of   church   government,   yet 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  405 

they  were  Calvinists  in  doctrine.  And  so  the  "Mar- 
tyrs Memorial,'"  at  Oxford,  which  marks  the  place 
of  their  burning,  becomes  a  sacred  place  to  the  Re- 
formed as  indeed  to  all  Protestants.  In  that  per- 
secution Bucer's  body,  which  had  been  buried  at 
Cambridge,  was  exhumed  and  burned. 

But  just  before  the  Marian  persecution  there  oc- 
curred an  event  at  London,  which  marks  one  of  the 
most  important  of  the  sacred  places  of  the  Re- 
formed. It  was  the  organization  of  the  Church  of 
Austin  Friars.  The  first  congregation  to  have  fully 
developed  Presbyterian  church-government  was 
this  Dutch  Reformed  church.  This  church,  how- 
ever, was  composed  of  people  of  many  languages, 
of  Dutch,  Germans.  Walloons  and  Italians  who 
were  refugees  for  Protestantism's  sake  from  the 
continent  of  Europe.  To  them,  in  1550,  was  given 
the  church  of  the  Augustinian  Friars,  later  called 
the  church  of  Austin  Friars,  located  behind  Dra- 
per's Flail,  in  the  very  heart  of  the  old  city  of  Lon- 
don. If  Zurich  and  Geneva  were  the  birth-place 
of  the  Reformed  doctrinally,  this  was  their  birth- 
place in  complete  local  organization.  The  first  con- 
gregation formed  along  purely  Presbyterial  lines 
was    founded   here    by    John    A'Lasco,    the    Polish 


406     famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

reformer.  This  congregation  was  not  under  a  bish- 
op and  so  Lasco  had  a  free  hand  in  organizing  it 
according  to  Biblical  lines.  The  church  officers 
were  elders,  deacons  and  doctors,  the  duty  of  the 
latter  being  to  foster  the  study  of  the  Bible.  He 
introduced  the  distinction  between  ruling  and  teach- 
ing elders,  the  elders  being  equal  with  the  minister. 
The  congregation  elected  these  officers.  Lasco  im- 
proved on  Calvin  in  church-government ;  his  was 
democratic  Presbyterianism,  Calvin's  aristocratic 
Presbyterianism.  Calvin's  did  not  aim  directly  at 
separation  of  church  and  state,  Lasco's  was  sep- 
arate from  the  state.  Calvin  often  gets  credit  for 
what  Lasco  has  done  for  our  present  presbyterial 
church  government.  Lasco  was  really  the  founder 
of  Presbyterial  government  in  the  congregation. 
Lasco  also  introduced  the  simple  Reformed  wor- 
ship, drawing  up  a  liturgy  which  is  especially  no- 
ticeable by  its  departures  from  the  Prayerbook  of 
the  Anglican  church.  He  set  aside  pictures,  can- 
dles, altars,  bells,  the  organ  and  kneeling  at  the 
communion,  the  latter  as  savoring  of  idolatry.  The 
minister  wore  no  robes  or  vestments.  Another  pe- 
culiarity of  this  congregation  was  its  prophesying, 
or  prayer-meeting,  thus  laying  the  basis  for  future 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  407 

Puritanism  in  England.  But  he  and  his  congrega- 
tion were  driven  out  when  Bloody  Queen  Mary 
came  to  the  throne  and  they  sailed  from  Grave- 
send  September  17,  1553.  for  Copenhagen,  and  Ger- 
many. Later,  when  Queen  Elizabeth  came  to  the 
throne,  the  church  was  again  given  to  the  foreign 
refugees  and  is  now  the  Dutch  Reformed  church 
of  Austin  Friars,  and  Dutch  worship  is  held  there 
on  Sunday  mornings. 

The  Marian  persecution  threw  the  English  re- 
formers into  the  hands  of  the  Reformed  on  the 
continent.  It  drove  the  leaders  of  the  reformation 
to  the  continent  where  they  found  an  asylum,  as  at 
Zurich  with  Bullinger.  He  took  some  of  them  into 
his  own  family  and  opened  an  English  theological 
seminary  for  their  young  students.  They  also 
found  an  asylum  at  Geneva  where  Calvin  gladly 
welcomed  them.  The  result  of  their  stay  on  the 
continent  was  that  when  they  came  back  to  Eng- 
land, most  of  them  had  become  deeply  imbued  with 
Reformed  views.  The  "Zurich  Letters,"  which 
contain  the  correspondence,  reveal  that  they  had 
low  views  of  episcopacy.  They  even  granted  the 
validity  of  Presbyterial  ordination.  The  influence 
especially  of  Bullinger,  became  very  great.    In  Eng- 


408    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

land  his  works  were  circulated  and  translated.  His 
theological  works  being  used  as  a  text-book  on  the- 
ology at  Oxford  University  for  many  years.  But 
gradually  the  stricter  theology  of  Calvin  became 
more  influential  than  Bullinger's.  And  his  works 
both  Latin  and  English,  had  a  large  circulation. 
The  Anglican  church  divided  into  two  parties,  Pre- 
latists  and  Puritans,  high-churchmen  and  low- 
churchmen.  The  low-church  part  in  the  Anglican 
church,  or  the  Puritans,  as  they  were  called,  gath- 
ered around  the  continental  Reformed  doctrines  of. 
Bullinger  and  Calvin. 

But  some  of  the  Puritans  finally  became  wearied 
at  their  failure  to  gain  greater  purity  of  doctrine 
and  worship  in  the  Anglican  church.  It  was  led  by 
Thomas  Cartwright.  They  organized  the  first 
Presbytery  at  Wandsworth,  in  1572,  then  a  few 
miles  southwest  of  London,  but  now  one  of  the 
suburbs  of  London,  so  that  Wandsworth  becomes 
another  sacred  place  for  the  Reformed. 

Thomas  Cartwright,  the  founder  of  Presbyteri- 
anism  in  England,  was  born  1535,  and  studied  at 
Cambridge,  becoming  later  professor  of  theology 
there  in  1569.  But  his  lectures  on  the  Acts  be- 
came so  popular  that  he  attacked  the  prelatic  party 


England,  J I 'ales  and  Ireland.  409 

(who  upheld  the  Episcopacy),  which  was  led  by 
Whitgift.  He  was  therefore  dismissed  from  his 
professorship  the  next  year.  He  went  to  the  conti- 
nent where  he  conferred  with  Beza,  but  returned 
in  1572.  He  now  contended  that  as  there  had  been 
a  reformation  in  the  church  in  doctrine,  there  was 
need  also  of  a  reformation  in  government  and  dis- 
cipline, so  as  to  make  it  conform  to  the  Xew  Testa- 
ment ideal.  Threatened  with  arrest  he  went  to  the 
Netherlands.  In  1585  he  had  returned  to  London 
without  royal  permission  and  was  cast  into  prison, 
but  powerful  friends  as  the  Earl  of  Leicester,  gain- 
ed his  release,  and  he  was  made  master  of  a  hos- 
pital at  Warwick.  There  he  introduced  free  pray- 
er into  the  worship  by  using  it  before  the  sermon. 
In  1590  the  book  of  Discipline  drawn  up  by  him,  had 
been  subscribed  by  500  ministers  and  in  1588  adopt- 
ed by  a  provincial  synod  at  Cambridge,  after  being 
approved  by  all  the  classes  fas  they  then  called 
their  presbyteries),  in  Warwickshire.  He  was 
again  imprisoned  but  released  in  1592  and  went  to 
the  island  of  Guernsey,  where  he  died  in  1603. 

Cartwright's  connection  _  with  Cambridge  calls 
attention  to  the  fact  that  Cambridge  has  been  a 
sacred  place  for  Puritanism  and  Calvinism.     Cam- 


410     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

bridge  was  the  university  that  stood  in  the  main  for 
low-churchism  and  Puritanism,  while  Oxford  has 
stood  in  the  main  for  ritualism.  There  is  a  saying  in 
England  that  "Cambridge  bred  the  founders  of  the 
English  reformation  and  Oxford  burned  them."' 
Cambridge  was  especially  the  Puritan  university. 
Two  of  its  colleges  were  founded  especially  for  the 
promotion  of  Puritanism,  Emanuel  and  Sidney. 
When  Emanuel  was  founded  by  Sir  Walter  Mild- 
may,  Queen  Elizabeth  charged  him  with  founding 
it  as  a  Puritan  foundation.  In  1603  a  writer  states 
the  Puritan  peculiarities,  that  while  the  other  col- 
leges use  the  prayerbook,  Emanuel  has  its  own  ser- 
vice— its  scholars  did  not  wear  surplice  and  hoods 
like  the  rest  of  the  colleges,  and  they  did  not  fast 
Fridays  and  they  sat  at  communion.  No  wonder 
it  was  called  a  Puritan  college !  It  was  from  this 
college  that  many  of  the  leaders  of  Puritanism  in 
New  England  came,  as  John  Cotton  and  Harvard, 
who  founded  Harvard  University ;  for  it  is  to  be 
remembered  that  while  the  Pilgrims  were  Congre- 
gationalists,  the  Puritans  of  New  England  were 
Presbyterian  in  their  form  of  church  government. 
The  Calvinistic  doctrines  were  taught  at  Cam- 
bridge.    Such  being  the  association  of  Puritanism 


England,  J  J 'ales  and  Ireland.  411 

and  Presbyterianism  with  Cambridge  it  is  very 
proper  that  the  Theological  School  of  the  present 
Presbyterian  Church  of  England  is  now  located  at 
Cambridge. 

The  next  prominent  Reformed  place  is  West- 
minster Abbey,  where  the  Westminster  Assembly 
was  held  1643.  It  was  composed  of  151  members, 
of  whom  only  six  were  Scotch.  Rev.  Dr.  Twisse 
opened  it  by  a  sermon  in  Westminster  Abbe}-  on 
Jul}-  1.  The  business  then  proceeded  in  the  chapel 
of  Henry  VII,  in  Westminster  Abbey.  There  were 
three  parties  in  that  Assembly,  the  Erastians,  who 
held  that  the  church  should  be  joined  to  the  state 
and  the  state  have  power  of  discipline.  The  sec- 
ond party  were  the  Congregationalists,  the  third 
were  the  Presbyterians.  The  problem  was  which 
would  control  the  Assembly.  The  Assembly  had 
1. 163  ses>ion-  and  the  Presbyterian  party  gained 
the  victor}-. 

An  interesting  tradition  of  this  Assembly  is  that 
the  committee  charged  to  prepare  a  catechism 
paused  when  it  came  to  preparing  an  answer  to 
the  question,  What  is  God  ?  and  the  youngest  mem- 
ber of  it.  but  one  of  the  ablest,  Gillespie,  replied  in 
the    beautiful    and    comprehensive    answer    of    the 


41-2     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Shorter  Catechism.  But  recent  investigations  seem 
to  show  that  this  tradition  is  not  true  as  several 
of  its  phrases  were  embodied  in  a  catechism  of  1645, 
yes,  some  going  back  to  the  Swiss  reformer  and 
catechism  writer,  Leo  Juda. 

But  although  the  Erastians  were  defeated  in  the 
Westminster  Assembly,  they  were  victorious  in  par- 
liament. The  Westminster  Confessions  were  never 
adopted  in  England  as  the  official  creed  of  the 
church,  as  in  Scotland,  although  parliament 
ordered  (1646)  that  elders  be  appointed  in 
every  congregation.  As  a  result  Presbyterian- 
ism  swept  over  England.  In  1648  all  parishes, 
except  chapels  of  the  king  and  of  the  peers, 
were  under  Presbyterian  government  and  Lon- 
don was  divided  into  twelve  presbyteries.  It 
was  then  "Presbyterian  London."  The  first  pro- 
vincial synod  met  at  the  convocation  house  of  St. 
Paul,  1647,  and  other  synods  were  organized. 
Presbyterianism  for  seventeen  years,  1646-1663,  be- 
came the  established  religion  of  England. 

But  the  revolution  under  Cromwell  put  an  end 
to  this,  for  the  Presbyterians  protested  against  the 
execution  of  the  king.  Finally  the  Act  of  Uni- 
formity forced  2,000  ministers,  of  whom  1,500 
were  Presbyterians,  out  of  the  church  on  St.  Bar- 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  413 

tholomew's  day.  1662.  And  for  23  years  Puritan- 
ism and  Presbyterianism  were  illegal  in  England. 
Among  those  who  were  thus  driven  out  of  the 
church  were  some  of  the  strongest  ministers,  as 
Baxter.  Howe,  the  Calamys  and  the  Henrys. 

Richard  Baxter  was  minister  at  Kidderminster 
(eighteen  miles  southwest  of  Birmingham)  and 
transformed  the  whole  community.  In  1660  he 
left  Kidderminster  for  London,  preaching  before 
the  House  of  Commons  at  St.  Margaret's  church. 
Westminster,  April  30.  1660,  and  before  the  Lord 
Mayor  and  aldermen  at  St.  Paul's.  May  10.  of  that 
year.  He  welcomed  Charles  11  back  and  the  latter 
offered  him  the  bishopric  of  Hereford,  which  he 
declined.  After  being  driven  out  of  the  Anglican 
church  in  [662,  as  he  persisted  in  preaching,  he  was 
imprisoned  twice.  Judge  Jeffreys  treating  him  with 
great  brutality  at  hi-  second  imprisonment.  Philip 
Henry,  the  father  of  Matthew  Henry  the  Commen- 
tator, was  also  one  of  the  ministers  driven  out  and 
imprisoned  at  Chester  castle.  His  son.  distinguish- 
ed for  his  commentary  on  the  Bible,  was  pastor  of 
the  Presbyterian  church  at  Chester  in  1687,  remain- 
ing there  2$  years,  then  removing  to  Hackney,  Lon- 
don. 1712,  and  dying  two  years  later. 

Then  came  the  Toleration  Edict  of   1689,  when 


414     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

William  and  Mary  had  become  king  and  queen  of 
England.  There  were  then  800  Presbyterian  con- 
gregations in  England,  40  in  London  alone.  The 
eighteenth  century  brought  to  the  church  the  blight 
of  rationalism,  because  subscription  to  the  West- 
minster standards  was  not  enforced.  The  result 
was  that  especially  in  southern  England,  Presby- 
terianism  and  Unitarianism  became  synonymous. 
This  laxity  of  doctrine  led  to  laxity  of  discipline 
and  government.  At  a  meeting  at  Salter's  Hall, 
London,  the  Calvinists  and  Evangelicals  were  out- 
voted by  the  Unitarians  by  a  vote  of  57-53.  As  a 
result  most  of  the  denomination  went  over  into 
Unitarianism.  In  1850  there  were  217  Unitarian 
congregations.  And  to-day  in  the  religious  adver- 
tisements in  the  London  newspapers,  one  will  often 
see  a  "Presbyterian  (Unitarian)  church."  These 
are  the  old  Presbyterian  churches,  who  have  gone 
off  into  Unitarianism.  But  the  Northumberland 
Presbytery,  in  the  north,  remained  faithful  and  ex- 
cluded Unitarianism. 

The  present  Presbyterian  Church  of  England  is 
composed  of  Scotch  settlers  in  England,  to  whom 
the  relics  of  the  old  Presbyterian  congregations  of 
England  joined  themselves.     In  1876  the  different 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  415 

branches  of  the  Presbyterian  churches  organized 
into  a  synod  at  Liverpool,  though  the  Established 
Church  of  Scotland  still  retains  about  a  dozen  con- 
gregations in  England.  The  Presbyterian  Church 
of  England  has  356  ministers,  350  churches  and 
85,000  communicants,  and  is  a  well-organized,  ag- 
gressive and  influential  church. 

Wales  has  its  Calvinistic  Methodist  Church,  at 
once  Calvinistic  and  yet  Methodist.  In  its  congre- 
gational organization,  it  is  Methodist,  but  in  its 
representative  upper  church-government  and  in  its 
doctrinal  standards  it  is  Calvinistic.  It  grew  out 
of  a  great  revival  in  Wales  beginning  1735-6, 
through  Howell  Harris,  a  layman,  and  Daniel  Row- 
lands and  Howell  Davies,  curates  of  the  Anglican 
church.  It  was  really  a  movement  within  the  Es- 
tablished Church  of  England  for  more  spirituality, 
a  new  development  in  the  Puritanism  of  that 
church,  as  Presbyterianism  had  been  a  century  and 
more  before.  Its  first  society  was  organized  at 
Erwood,  in  Brecknock  County,  in  1736,  and  its 
first  General  Assembly  at  Watford,  County  of  Gla- 
morgan, January  5-6,  1642.  If  John  Wesley  led 
to  the  formation  of  the  Methodist  Church,  Whit- 
field, the  great  evangelist  of  the  eighteenth  century, 


416     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

led  to  the  formation  of  this  Welsh  Calvinistic 
church.  He  was  made  moderator  of  the  Watford 
Association.  Whitfieldism  left  its  impress  on  this 
church  as  Wesley  did  on  the  Methodists.  The 
Church,  like  him,  has  been  Calvinistic  and  adopted 
a  creed  like  the  Westminster  Confession  and  the 
Thirty-nine  Articles  of  the  Church  of  England, 
which  is  Calvinistic  in  its  statements.  Another 
great  revival  in  1762-3  added  to  its  prosperity. 

But  it  was  the  coming  into  that  church  of  Rev. 
Thomas  Charles  of  Bala,  that  gave  new  vigor  to  the 
church.  lie  made  long  preaching  tours  over  all 
of  North  Wales,  instituted  circulating  schools  and 
Sunday  schools  and  at  his  own  expense  he  trained 
teachers. 

Bala  is  the  great  sacred  place  of  this  Calvinistic 
Methodist  church.  Here  Rev.  Mr.  Charles  lived, 
and  it  is  now  the  seat  of  their  college  and  theolog- 
ical school.  It  was  here  that  occurred  that  incident, 
that  led  to  the  founding  of  the  British  and  Foreign 
Bible  Society.  Alary  Jones,  born  1782,  was-  the 
daughter  of  a  poor  weaver,  living  at  the  foot  of 
Cader  Idris.  As  she  attended  Sunday  school,  the 
longing  to  possess  a  Bible  of  her  own  greatly  took 
hold  of  her,  for  Bibles  were  scarce  and  expensive 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  417 

in  Wales  in  those  days,  the  nearest  one  being  two 
miles  off.  She  determined  to  save  money  enough 
to  buy  one,  and  after  years  of  saving  had  enough 
gathered  to  purchase  a  Bible.  She  then,  sixteen 
years  old,  walked  all  the  way  to  Bala,  twenty-five 
miles  away,  bare-footed,  carrying  her  boots,  to  put 
them  on  just  as  she  arrived  outside  of  Bala.  She 
called  on  Rev.  Mr.  Charles  and  told  her  story.  Re- 
gretfully he  told  her  that  all  the  Bibles  had  been 
sold  except  one  or  two  copies  that  he  had  retained 
for  friends.  She  wept  bitterly  at  this  disappoint- 
ment. He  could  not  withstand  her  tears  and  gave 
her  one  of  the  promised  Bibles.  She  went  home, 
lived  to  a  great  age  and  had  the  Bible  she  bought 
at  Bala  at  her  bedside  when  she  passed  away.  On 
December,  1802,  Rev.  Mr.  Charles  told  the  story 
of  Mary  Jones  to  the  Religious  Tract  Society,  at 
London,  to  show  the  great  hunger  of  Wales  for  the 
Word  of  God.  On  hearing  him  the  secretary  of  the 
society  said,  "Surely  a  society  might  be  formed  to 
provide  Bibles  for  Wales,  and  if  for  Wales,  why 
not  for  the  world?"  This  led  to  the  foundation  in 
1804,  of  the  British  and  Foreign  Bible  Society,  the 
earliest  and  greatest  of  the  world's  Bible  Societies. 
It  began  its  work  by  printing  the  Bible  for  Wales. 


418     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

When  the  first  wagon-load  of  Bibles,  in  1806,  came 
to  Wales,  it  was  received  as  the  Israelites  received 
the  Ark  of  the  Covenant.  The  people,  with  shouts 
of  joy,  dragged  it  into  the  city.  Wales  has  ever  been 
the  land  of  the  Bible  and  it  has  been  said  that  there 
is  not  an  infidel  book  in  their  language.  Thus  it 
has  been  true  to  one  of  the  cardinal  doctrines  of  the 
Calvinists,  the  supremacy  of  Scripture.  The  Cal- 
vinistic  Methodist  Church  of  Wales  now  numbers 
1,442  congregations,  955  ministers  and  186,000 
communicants. 

Ireland,  too,  has  its  representatives  of  the  Re- 
formed faith  in  the  Irish  Presbyterian  Church. 
Northern  Ireland  was  settled  by  Scotland,  who 
brought  their  Presbyterianism  with  them.  The 
first  presbytery  was  formed  at  Carrickfergus  in 
1642.  and  by  1647  there  were  thirty  ministers  in 
the  province  of  Ulster.  When  King  Charles  II 
was  restored,  many  of  the  Presbyterian  ministers 
were  ejected  from  their  parishes.  The  "Solemn 
League  and  Covenant  of  the  Church"  was  burned 
in  the  principal  towns  by  hangman.  Persecution 
continued  until  William  and  Mary  became  rulers 
of  England. 

A«   far  as  we  are  able  to  see,  the  main  sacred 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  419 

places  of  the  Irish  church  are  Carrickfergus,  where 
the  first  presbytery  was  organized,  Derry  or  Lon- 
denderry  and  the  battlefield  of  the  Boyne.  Derry 
became  the  centre  of  the  church,  although  it  is  now 
surpassed  in  size  by  Belfast.  But  the  seige  of  Lon- 
donderry has  made  it  a  sacred  place  to  the  Irish 
Protestants.  On  December  7,  1688,  a  few  appren- 
tice boys  at  Derry  seized  the  keys  of  the  city  and 
shut  the  gates,  because  of  a  report  that  the  Cath- 
olics would  rise  and  murder  the  Protestants.  Derry 
thus  became  the  refuge  for  the  Protestants  of  the 
province.  It  was  beseiged  (1689)  by  King  James 
with  his  Catholic  army  and  made  a  brave  defense 
for  105  days  against  an  overwhelming  force.  A 
British  frigate  broke  the  boom  that  was  stretched 
across  the  river  Foyle,  and  two  vessels,  laden  with 
provisions,  entered  the  city  and  saved  it  from  fam- 
ine. The  following  night,  October  31,  the  army  of 
King  James  retreated.  In  consideration  of  their 
gallant  conduct,  King  William  ordered  $60,000  to 
be  paid  annually  to  the  Presbyterian  ministers  as  a 
royal  gift,  which  was  continued  to  be  done  until 
1870. 

The  battle  of  the  Boyne,  July   1,   1690,  was  the 
great  final  contest  between  Protestantism  and  Cath- 


420    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

olicism  in  the  British  Isles ;  indeed  not  in  Britain 
alone,  but  for  all  Europe.  For  the  Catholic  powers 
of  Europe,  led  especially  by  King  Lonis  XIV,  of 
France,  were  getting  ready  to  do  what  they  had 
tried  to  do  in  the  Thirty  Years  war,  namely,  to 
crush  out  Protestantism.  But  the  battle  of  the 
Boyne  was  the  first  thunderclap  in  the  shape  of  a 
defeat  to  their  plans  and,  except  in  western  Ger- 
many, they  never  went  any  farther.  But  if  the 
Protestants  had  been  defeated  at  the  Boyne  the 
Catholic  prince  would  have  moved  toward  the  in- 
troduction of  interims  in  Europe  as  they  had  done 
in  the  Thirty  Years  war,  which  were  only  the  pre- 
lude to  the  utter  destruction  of  Protestantism 

This  battle  of  the  Boyne  is  also  significant  be- 
cause in  it  occurred  one  of  the  striking  revenges 
of  history  that  have  so  often  appeared  against 
France  for  her  driving  out  of  the  Huguenots  in 
1685,  by  the  Revocation  of  the  Edict  of  Xantes. 
At  the  battle  of  the  Boyne  France's  troops,  who 
formed  part  of  King  James'  army,  were  defeated 
by  one  of  those  Huguenots,  whom  France  had  cast 
out.  Louis  the  Great  had  put  into  the  hands  of  his 
enemies  his  greatest  general.  Marshal  Frederick  of 
Schomberg.      When    William,    Prince   of    Orange, 


England,  Wales  and  Ireland.  421 

went  to  England  to  assume  the  throne,  he  asked  the 
Elector  of  Bradenburg  at  Berlin  to  loan  him  his 
general-in-chief,  which  he  did,  and  Schomberg  went 
to  England  as  commander.  The  battle  was  very 
fiercely  waged.  And  in  it.  just  as  Schomberg  called 
the  attention  of  the  Huguenot  troops  of  his  army 
to  the  French  corps  in  the  Catholic  army,  and  haa 
said,  ''You  see  there  your  persecutors,"  he  was 
wounded  and  shortly  after  killed.  The  Irish  army 
was  completely  defeated  and  James  sailed  for 
France,  giving  up  the  struggle  for  the  English 
throne.  A  Huguenot  saved  the  clay.  Marshall 
Schomberg  is  buried  in  St.  Patrick's  cathedral, 
Dublin. 

In  1690  a  General  Synod  of  Ulster  was  organized 
at  Belfast,  making  Belfast  the  fourth  sacred  place 
of  this  church.  Belfast,  with  its  many  congrega- 
tions, now  is  the  great  centre  of  the  Irish  church. 
That  Irish  Presbyterian  church  now  has  105,000 
communicants,  the  Reformed  Presbyterian,  3,800, 
and  the  Original  Seceders,  1,200.  These  make  up 
the  Presbvterian  strength  of  Ireland. 


Chapter  VIII.— EDINBURGH. 

THIS  picturesque,  romantic  city  of  the  Scots 
has  been  so  often  described,  in  the  beauti- 
ful language  of  both  prose  and  verse,  that 
one  would  be  presumptive  who  should  attempt  the 
task  anew,  without  reference  to  the  glowing  sen- 
tences already  penned  and  printed. 

Dr.  Thomas  Guthrie,  of  eloquent  utterance, 
whose  home  and  pulpit  were  in  Edinburgh,  for  the 
latter  half  of  his  life,  found  daily  enjoyment  in 
the  craggy  heights  and  classic  beauty  of  the  "Grey 
Metropolis  of  the  North."  When  visitors  from 
other  lands  were  his  guests,  he  delighted  to  point 
out  to  them  the  unique  features  of  the  scene. 

His  own  words  were  these : 

"Ere  the  heat  of  the  day  has  cast  a  misty  veil 
upon  the  scene,  I  take  a  stranger,  and,  conducting 
his  steps  to  yonder  rocky  rampart,  I  bid  him  look. 
Gothic  towers,  Grecian  temples,  palaces,  spires, 
domes,  monuments  and  verdant  gardens,  pictur- 
esquely mingled,  are  spread  out  before  his  eye: 
wherever  he  turns  he  finds  a  point  of  view  to  claim 
his  admiration.  What  rare  variety  of  hill 
and  hollow !  What  happy  combination  of  mod- 
423 


424     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

ern  and  ancient  architecture !  Two  distant  ages 
gaze  at  each  other  across  the  intervening  valley." 

The  Castle  rock  is  the  point  of  vantage  which  is 
indicated.  Lord  Macaulay  suggests  a  comparison 
between  Edinburgh  and  Florence,  in  the  generation 
preceding  the  Protestant  Reformation  and  in  his 
own  time,  and  finds  the  reason  for  the  incomparable 
progress  and  development  of  the  northern  city, 
""owing  less  to  climate,  soil  and  the  fostering  care 
of  rulers,"  in  the  enthronement  of  Protestant  prin- 
ciples in  the  hearts  and  lives  of  her  people. 

Professor  Wilson,  "Christopher  North,"  sings 
the  picturesque  beauty  of  the  "Scots'  City  of  the 
Seven  Hills"  in  noble  verse : 

"Queen  of  the  unconquered  North ! 
Stately  thou  sittest  on  thy  mountain  throne, 
Thy  towers  and  temples  like  a  cloudy  sky; 
And  scarce  can  tell  what  fabrics  are  thine  own, 
Hung  'mid  the  air-built  phantoms  floating  by." 

But  upon  no  stranger  or  son  has  the  charm  of 
Edinburgh's  solemn  yet  seductive  beauty  exercised 
so  strong  a  spell  as  upon  the  sympathetic  soul  of 
Sir  Walter  Scott,  whose  passion  was  to  praise  her 
in  story  and  in  song.  It  was  "a  ruling  passion 
strong  in  death."     Even  in  "his  last  illness,  when 


Edinburgh.  425 

the  great  intellect  was  already  under  eclipse,  he 
constantly  recalled  sights  and  scenes  in  the  'High 
Street  and  Canongate,'  every  ancient  building  of 
which  he  knew  so  well." 

His  "Marmion"  brings  back  the  Poet's  vision 
from  Blackford  Hill,  of  the  fair  scene  immediately 
at  hand  and  the  outlook  to 

"Where  the  huge  castle  holds  its   state, 
And  all  the  steep  slope  down. 
Whose  ridgy  back  heaves  to  the  sky 
Piled  deep  and  massy,  close  and  high, 
Mine  own  romantic  town." 

His  romance  of  Midlothian  has  invested  the 
heart-shaped  chiselling  in  the  pavement  near  St. 
Giles  and  the  grave  of  John  Knox,  where  the  Old 
Tolbooth  used  to  stand,  with  an  immortal  interest, 
and,  none  the  less,  do  the  Castle,  the  Cathedral, 
and  Holyrood  where  ''his  Alary  Stuart  haunts  all 
the  rooms"  and  still  seems  "to  go  up  and  down 
those  worn,  stony  stairways,"  and  Heriot's  hos- 
pital and  many  another  show  spot  of  the  old  town 
hold  the  attention  and  imagination  of  the  tourist, 
because  interpreted  by  the  fascinating  pages  of  the 
"Wizard  of  the  North." 

As  in  the  country  beyond,  "the  lochs  and  moun- 


426     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

tains,  bracken  and  heathery  moors  all  give  back  to 
us  the  echo  of  the  one  name," — so  Margaret  J. 
Preston,  the  American  poetess,  tells  us ;  and  she 
exclaims  "what  were  beautiful  Scotland  without 
Sir  Walter  as  the  interpreter  of  her  legends  and 
her  history,  of  her  sufferings  and  her  glory!" — 
so  the  ancient  city  is  alive  again,  after  the  fashion 
of  her  long  gone  years,  when  Sir  Walter  is  one's 
guide. 

Your  cab-driver  will  fill  you  with  wonder  by 
minute  knowledge  of  his  works  and  of  his  associa- 
tions with  the  city.  He  will  let  you  "follow  the 
limping  boy  to  the  high  school"  and  take  you  in 
his  company  to  the  Grass-market  and  up  and  down 
the  Canongate.  He  will  take  you  to  Castle  street 
and  to  the  house  marked  by  Sir  Walter's  bust 
above  the  door,  where,  "with  only  a  patch  of  shabby 
sky  visible,"  he  wrote  the  best  of  his  novels ;  to 
Davie  Dean's  cottage,  and  if  you  wish,  away  be- 
yond the  limits  of  the  city  to  Reuben  Butler's 
school-room  and  the  spot  where  Efhe  was  wont  to 
meet  her  lover;  and  if  "the  Heart  of  Midlothian" 
is  in  your  mind,  on  your  return,  you  will  all  but 
see  grave  yet  gentle  Jeanie  walking  down  High 
street  toward  Douce  Davie's  humble  home. 


Edinburgh,  427 

Before  you  part  with  Sir  Walter  you  will  wish  to 
see  the  monument  erected  to  his  memory  by  a  grate- 
ful city,  forever  proud  of  her  illustrious  son,  in 
the  new  town,  on  the  far-famed  Princes  street.  It 
resembles  "a  Gothic  spire,  surmounted  by  many 
pinnacles,  among  which  are  niched  some  thirty  of 
the  principal  characters  of  Scott's  novels.  Under 
the  dome  sits  Sir  Walter,  wrapped  in  his  plaid,  in 
a  brooding  attitude,  while  Maida,  his  favorite  dog. 
lies  at  hi^  feet." 

It  is  said  that  the  architect  of  this  noble  pile, 
when  a  lad  of  twelve  years,  had  been  picked  up  by 
Sir  Walter,  as  the  great  writer  was  driving  one  day 
among  the  Pentland  Hills.  Trudging  along  the 
road  beneath  a  heavy  burden,  the  boy  was  taken  up 
into  the  carriage  and  was  led  into  a  kindly  con- 
versation which  drew  out  his  hopes  and  plans,  and 
when  he  left  the  great  man  at  his  journey's  end  it 
was  with  a  crown  in  his  hand  and  a  glow  in  his 
heart.  From  that  hour  his  admiration  for  his  ben- 
efactor became  a  passion.  He  studied  architecture, 
and,  when  designs  for  the  monument  were  sub- 
mitted, his  drawing  was  chosen.  The  pathetic  part 
of  the  story  is  that  he  did  not  live  to  see  completed 
the  work  into  which  he  had  put  all  his  heart.    Mrs. 


428     Famous  Places 'of  Reformed  Churches. 

Preston  recalls  this  tale,  as  thus  recited,  and  other 
facts  and  fancies  I  have  given,  in  a  charming  lit- 
tle travel  sketch,  entitled  "A  Handful  of  Mono- 
graphs." 

The  history  of  Edinburgh — Edwinsburgh,  the 
named  derived  from  Edwin  of  Deira,  Saxon  King, 
from  its  beginnings  "amidst  the  mists  of  a  hoary 
antiquity,"  to  the  present  time  is  a  thrilling  story, 
In  barest  outline  some  of  the  outstanding  features 
may  be  mentioned :  Its  association  with  King 
Arthur,  the  hero  of  romance,  "the  blameless  King" 
of  the  Tennyson  "Idylls,"  whose  "head"  was  cut 
out  in  profile  against  the  rocks  of  Salisbury  Crags, 
and  whom  tradition  pictures  as  worn  out  by  pro- 
tracted struggle  with  the  Saxons,  and  as  sitting  to 
rest  on  the  hill,  on  the  spot  still  known  as  "Ar- 
thur's Seat,"  and  witnessing  the  battle  that  checked 
the  enemy's  advance ;  the  coming  of  Edwin  and 
the  founding  of  a  village  about  the  rock  fortress ; 
the  union  of  Picts  and  Scotts  and  their  stand  against 
Angles  and  Britons ;  the  reign  of  Malcolm  II  (1005- 
1034)  ;  the  reign  of  Malcolm  III  and  of  his  beauti- 
ful and  pious  Queen  Margaret,  who  sought  to  in- 
troduce culture  and  civilization  among  the  rude 
people  of  the  little  realm  and  whose  memory  is  pre- 


Edinburgh.  429 

served  in  the  early  Norman  Chapel,  near  by  the 
Castle,  where  she  spent  much  time  in  prayer ;  the 
reign  of  King  David  I,  whose  deliverance  from 
an  infuriated  stag  on  the  day  of  the  Holy  Rood 
led  to  the  establishment  of  the  Abbey  of  the  Holy- 
rood,  which  in  times  of  peace  shared  the  honor  of 
a  royal  residence  with  the  Castle ;  the  succession 
down  to  the  age  of  Edward  I  of  England,  who  took 
the  castle  in  1291,  the  capture  of  the  castle  under 
Robert  Bruce;  and  the  reigns  of  the  kings,  includ- 
ing that  of  David  II,  whose  death  in  1370  termi- 
nated the  direct  line  of  the  Bruce, — all  this  must 
be  passed  by  with  merest  mention. 

Likewise,  the  better  known  story  of  the  Stuarts, 
"a  gay,  accomplished,  improvident  race,"  who  made 
the  city  Royal  Edinburgh  indeed,  extending  and 
beautifying  the  town  and  raising  it  in  the  scale  of 
national  importance.  A  concise  but  clear  outline  of 
this  history  down  to  the  fascinating  narrative  of 
the  pathetic  but  guilty  "Mary,  Queen  of  Scots"  and 
the  "Union  of  the  Crowns,"  in  her  son,  James  VI, 
of  Scotland,  I  of  England,  may  be  read  in  "Edin- 
burgh" of  "the  Mediaeval  Towns  Series,"  by  Oli- 
phant  Smeaton,  or  in  "Edinburgh — a  Historical 
and  Topographical  Account  of  the  City,"  by  M.  G 


430    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

Williamson,  both  of  which  little  volumes  are  beau- 
tifully illustrated. 

In  these  books,  too,  the  subsequent  history  of  the 
Union  of  the  Parliaments  will  be  found — that  bit- 
ter cup  for  many  loyal  Scots — the  formal  dissolu- 
tion of  the  "Scots  Estates"  taking  place  in  Edin- 
burgh on  the  25th  of  March,  1707,  when  the  Earl 
of  Seafield,  the  Chancellor,  as  he  descended  from 
his  official  chair,  assuming  a  jocular  air  to  veil  his 
emotion,  exclaimed :  "Thus  endeth  an  auld  sang." 
It  meant  the  sinking  of  Edinburgh  to  the  level  of 
a  provincial  city  in  the  kingdom  of  Great  Britain. 
And  for  fifty  years,  her  people  passed  through  a 
period  of  profound  depression  and  gloom.  Not 
until  the  glory  of  her  university  arose,  and  "the 
brilliant  coterie  of  literary  men  resident  there  had 
made  her  famous  throughout  the  world,  did  she 
again  lift  up  her  head  and  seat  herself  once  more 
on  her  throne,  as  the  grey  metropolis  of  the  north." 
In  1794,  Thomas  Jefferson  reported  to  the  legis- 
lature of  Virginia  that  "the  Colleges  of  Geneva  and 
Edinburgh  were  the  two  eyes  of  Europe  in  matters 
of  science." 

The  still  later  history  of  the  city,  from  the  union 
of  the  kingdoms  to  the  rebellion  of  1745,  under 
"Bonnie   Prince   Charlie,"   of    Scott's   song,   which 


Edinburgh.  431 

came  to  an  end  on  the  bloody  field  of  Culloden, 
where  the  hopes  of  the  Stuarts  of  re-possessing  the 
throne  of  Great  Britain  were  forever  annihilated; 
and  from  the  rebellion  to  the  present  time,  may  also 
be  found  in  the  volumes  I  have  named,  which, 
being  inexpensive  and  portable,  the  visitor  to  Edin- 
burgh will  do  well  to  have  in  his  possession.  I 
have  used  them  freely  in  writing  this  sketch. 

The  literary  associations  of  Edinburgh  are  of 
intense  interest.  In  this  respect,  "Sir  Walter,"  as 
his  admirers  love  to  call  him,  is  pre-eminent.  But 
the  list  of  men  of  mind  whose  pens  and  tongues 
made  the  city  enduringly  famous  is  long  and  im- 
posing. 

Edinburgh  is  a  "city  of  song,"  and  a  city  of 
story,  a  city  of  philosophers,  historians  and  essay- 
ists, from  the  days  of  William  Dunbar,  the  Loure- 
ate  of  the  reign  of  James  IV  (1473-15 13),  to  our 
own  days,  when  Robert  Louis  Stevenson,  poet, 
novelist  and  essayist  (whose  birth  and  early  life 
belong  to  Edinburgh,  though  lonely  Samoa  gave 
him  his  grave,  after  the  heroism  of  his  suffering 
years),  wrote  his  fascinating  pages,  men  of  genius 
added  the  lustre  of  literary  brilliancy  to  the  glory 
of  the  city.  Among  the  poets,  Scotchmen  rate 
high,  after  Dunbar,  Alevander  Scott,  whose  lyrics 


432     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

"are  still  read  with  delight,"  Sir  David  Lyndsay, 
who  occupied  the  place  of  the  "people's  poet," 
which  Burns  afterwards  held,  and  whose  satires 
against  the  vices  and  frivolities  of  the  priests  are 
said  (who  can  quite  believe  this?)  to  have  "done 
more  for  the  reformation  than  all  the  sermons  of 
John  Knox,"  and  Allan  Ramsay,  author  of  "The 
Gentle  Shepherd,"  a  poem  "so  true  to  nature  and 
its  simplicity  that  it  found  its  way  at  once  to  the 
hearts  of  the  people  and  few  lowland  homes  in 
earlier  days  were  without  a  copy  of  it. 

Better  known  to  us,  of  America,  beside  Scott  and 
Stevenson,  are  Thomas  Campbell,  whose  "Pleasures 
of  Hope,"  James  Graham,  whose  beautiful  poem  on 
"The  Sabbath,"  and  Robert  Pollock,  whose  "Course 
of  Time,"  our  fathers  and  mothers  read  and  quoted 
oft. 

Of  the  philosophers,  David  Hume  was  a  bril- 
liant figure  in  the  18th  century — often  called  "the 
Augustan  Age  of  Scotland."  He  too  was  a  great 
historian,  as  his  well-known  History  of  England 
shows. 

He  lived  in  Riddle's  Court,  where  most  of  his 
history  was  written ;  also  in  what  was  known  as 
Jack's  Land,  in  the  Canongate,  and  in  James'  Court, 
where   he   often   regaled   his    friends   with   supper, 


Edinburgh.  433 

among  them  Adam  Smith,  author  of  "The  Wealth 
of  Nations,"  "Father  of  Political  Economy,"  Adam 
Ferguson,  Chaplain  of  the  4.26.  or  Black  Watch 
Regiment,  whose  military  service  "gave  great  clear- 
ness to  his  account  of  battles  in  his  History  of 
Rome,  and  Dr.  Hugh  Blair,  a  clergyman  of  the 
High  Church  and  professor  of  rhetoric  in  the  uni- 
versity, the  admiration  of  people  of  position  and 
rank,  to  whom  King  George  III,  who  read  and  ad- 
mired his  published  sermons,  gave  a  pension  of  200 
pounds  a  year."  Hume  was  a  sceptic,  but  not  an 
atheist,  and  wrote  his  books  of  attack  on  revealed 
religion — so  one  of  his  brilliant  contemporaries 
said,  "from  affectation  and  love  of  vainglory."  The 
house  in  St.  James'  Court  is  now  occupied  by  the 
Department  of  Foreign  Missions,  in  the  United 
Free  Church  offices. 

Hume  built  a  new  house,  near  St.  Andrew's 
Square,  in  the  "New  Town,"  and  on  the  street, 
leading  to  Princes  street,  which  had  not  then  been 
named.  One  of  the  daughters  of  the  chief  baron 
got  a  workman  to  paint  on  the  cornerstone  of 
Hume's  house,  "St.  David's  Street."  Hume  laugh- 
ed, when  his  attention  was  called  to  it,  and  said, 
"Never  heed :  many  a  better  man  has  been  made 
a  saint  before  now." 


434    Famous  Place  sof  Reformed  Churches. 

Dngald  Stewart,  whose  philosophy  was  formerly 
taught  in  nearly  every  college  of  the  United  States 
of  America,  to  "defend  the  great  truths  of  natural, 
and  so  supply  evidence  of  revealed  religion,"  was 
an  Edinburgh  man,  and  lived  in  a  part  of  the  old 
Whitefoorde  House,  not  far  from  Holyrood. 
Thomas  Chalmers,  one  of  the  "three  mighties"  in 
the  Free  Church  (Candlish  and  Cunningham  com- 
pleting the  trio),  was  "the  first  to  bring  the  phil- 
osophy of  Scotland  into  harmony  with  the  evan- 
gelical faith  of  the  nation."  He  was  one  of  the 
most  potent  spiritual  forces  of  his  age. 

Great  historians  lived  and  labored  in  the  city. 
In  the  days  of  Queen  Mary's  reign,  there  was 
her  reader  and  tutor,  George  Buchanan,  the  eminent 
Latin  scholar,  the  "scholar  of  the  reformation," 
"Scotland's  Greatest  Scholar,"  who  admired  the 
queen's  ability  and  celebrated  her  marriage  to 
Darnley,  in  verse,  but  afterwards,  in  his  History, 
"condemned  the  unhappy  queen  in  no  measured 
terms."  He  had  expanded  the  cause  of  the  refor- 
mation. 

In  1567,  shortly  after  Mary  was  imprisoned  in 
Lochleven,  Buchanan,  though  a  layman,  was  made 
Moderator  of  the  General  Assembly. 


Edinburgh.  435 

John  Knox  wrote  history  as  strenuously  as  he 
preached  in  the  pulpit  of  St.  Giles,  where  he  said, 
"I  am  in  the  place  where  I  must  speak  the  truth, 
and  the  truth  I  will  speak,  impugn  it  who  so  list." 

William  Robertson,  elected  principal  of  Edin- 
burgh University,  at  forty-one,  "took  the  reading 
world  by  storm  with  his  "History  of  Scotland,"  his 
"History  of  America,"  and  his  "Charles  V,"  to 
which  was  prefixed  his  "View  of  the  State  of  So- 
ciety in  Europe  to  the  Beginning  of  the  Sixteenth 
Century,"  "the  most  valuable  of  all  his  works." 
He  died  in  i/C>2.  Dr.  Thomas  McCrie,  the  eminent 
ecclesiastical  historian,  was  one  of  Edinburgh's 
great  men  of  letters. 

The  "Old  Edinburgh"  of  the  middle  of  the  18th 
century  was  the  centre  of  a  brilliant  literary  world. 
It  was  the  picturesque  city  of  the  wynds  and  closes, 
"of  snug  familiarity,  when  you  could  shake  hands 
with  your  friends  from  your  respective  windows,  on 
opposite  sides  of  the  closes,"  "when  conviviality 
was  a  cardinal  virtue"  and  so  prolonged  were  the 
dinners  of  these  men  of  letters  that  "one  was  apt 
to  forget  whether  he  was  sitting  at  yesterday's  din- 
ner or  to-day's." 

Having  taken   these   glances   at   romantic   Edin- 


436    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

burgh,  the  Edinburgh  of  history  and  the  Edin- 
burgh of  letters,  let  us  conclude  our  hasty  survey 
of  the  enchanting  city  of  the  north  with  a  view  of 
ecclesiastical  Edinburgh. 

To  the  heart  of  the  Scot  the  dearest  institution 
has  ever  been  the  Kirk,  and  all  that  it  represents. 
Space  to  write  or  time  to  read  will  not  permit  us 
to  go  back  of  that  age  when,  as  Airs.  Oliphant  puts 
it,  "Alary  reigned  at  Holyrood  and  John  Knox  in 
St.  Giles."  The  chief  interest  of  the  palace  and 
Abbey  of  Holyrood  centres  in  Alary,  Queen  of 
Scots,  and  her  controversy  with  the  Reformed 
Church,  as  represented  by  Knox. 

Originally,  Holyrood  formed  no  part  of  Edin- 
burgh, but  was  connected  with  the  neighboring 
burgh  of  Canongate.  Edinburgh  clustered  round 
the  castle  for  protection,  and  Canongate-burgh 
about  Holyrood,  but,  as  time  passed,  the  two  burghs 
grew  together  and  became  one.  At  the  Reforma- 
tion, John  Knox,  preacher  and  pastor  of  St.  Giles, 
was  summoned  to  Holyrood  for  the  famous  inter- 
views with  the  Catholic  queen,  in  which  she  tried 
her  best  to  intimidate  and  awe  him,  but  in  vain; 
and  plied  her  exquisite  art  to  flatter  him  to  no  bet- 
ter purpose.     In  a  torrent  of  tears  and  tempest  of 


Edinburgh.  437 

passion  the  beautiful  queen  stormed  and  railed  at 
him,  only  to  receive  the  undaunted  answer,  "I  am 
neither  earl,  lord  nor  baron,  in  the  kingdom,  yet, 
madam,  it  appertains  to  me  no  less  to  forewarn  of 
such  things  as  may  hurt  it,  if  I  foresee  them,  than 
it  doth  to  any  of  the  nobility."  To  the  great  preach- 
er, "the  prophet  of  the  reformation,"  "one  mass 
was  worse  for  Scotland  than  a  hostile  army."  Par- 
liament was  plastic  in  the  bands  of  the  queen,  the 
nobles  were  ready  to  compromise.  Yet  Mary 
learned,  to  her  bitter  regret  and  chagrin,  as  Knox's 
acquittal,  upon  trial  for  treason,  based  on  his  bold 
utterances  in  St.  Giles  and  his  famous  circular  au- 
thorized by  the  general  assembly  of  the  church, 
proved.  His  brave  and  able  defence  won  the  day. 
The  proposed  assassination  of  the  Protestants  in 
her  realm,  as  in  France,  by  which  she  hoped  to  be 
freed  from  her  enemy,  was  thwarted  by  "the  jeal- 
ousy which  arose  between  Mary  and  her  husband ; 
and  the  consequent  murder  of  Rizzio  turned  the 
fierce  currents  of  history  into  other  channels,  and 
Scotland  was  saved  from  the  horrors  of  a  massa- 
cre such  as  that  of  St.  Bartholomew."  The  thrill- 
ing story  takes  on  intensity  of  interest  when  one 
goes  through  the  palace  and  sees  Lord  Darnley's 


438    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

suit  of  rooms,  the  bed  chamber  with  its  pictures  of 
Daruley,  Queen  Mary  and  John  Knox,  and  the 
queen's  apartments,  the  secret  stairway,  the  passage 
at  the  entrance  to  her  rooms  where  a  brass  plate 
marks  the  spot  of  Rizzio's  death,  the  audience 
chamber  where  Mary  had  her  historic  "wars  of 
words"  with  John  Knox. 

Within  and  without  palace  and  abbey,  the  visi- 
tor will  find  much  to  hold  his  attention, — within, 
tapestries,  pictures,  armorial  bearings,  carvings  and 
historic  furniture ;  without,  the  king's  park,  the 
king's  drive,  St.  Leonard's  Hill,  Jeanie  Dean's  cot- 
tage, with  its  fine  view  of  Salisbury  Crags,  and  the 
Dumbiedykes,  long  ranges  of  walls  stretching  to- 
ward Holyrood. 

St.  Giles  cathedral  stands  in  Parliament  Square. 
Of  all  churches  in  Edinburgh  it  is  the  best  known 
to  citizens  and  visitors  alike.  Its  location,  its  an- 
tiquity, its  architecture  and  its  inseparable  asso- 
ciation with  the  entire  history  of  the  city  make  it 
so.  The  original  building  was  replaced  in  1120 
by  a  church  of  early  Norman  architecture,  and  this, 
in  course  of  time,  by  frequent  changes  and  addi- 
tions, became  the  present  gothic  edifice.  "In  1466, 
St.  Giles  was  transformed  from  an  ordinary  parish 


Edinburgh.  439 

church  into  a  collegiate  charge,  with  a  chapter  to 
consist  of  provost,  curate,  sixteen  prebendaries,  a 
minister  of  the  choir,  four  choristers,  a  sacristan 
and  a  beadle,  in  addition  to  the  chaplains  who  serv- 
ed the  various  altars."  The  pope  granted  a  bull 
placing  it  under  his  own  jurisdiction. 

The  reformation  swept  away  much  that  was  in- 
separably connected  with  it.  It  was  cleared  of 
images,  the  famous  image  of  St.  Giles  being  thrown 
into  the  Nor'  Loch,  where  it  was  customary  to 
duck  witches.  Knox  described  the  drastic  meas- 
ures :  "Down  go  the  crosses,  off  go  the  surplices, 
round  caps  and  cornets,  with  crowns.  The  Grey 
Friars  gaped,  the  Black  Friars  blew,  the  priests 
panted  and  fled,  and  happy  was  he  that  got  first 
to  the  house,  for  such  a  sudden  fray  came  never 
among  the  generation  of  Anti-Christ  within  this 
realm  before." 

"Melancholy  as  was  its  aspect,  it  was  never  de- 
serted as  long  as  Knox  preached."  His  congrega- 
tion numbered  3,000.  There  were  no  seats  in  the 
"choir"  reserved  for  worshippers.  Those  who  de- 
sired brought  their  own  stools, — among  them,  at  a 
later  date,  Jenny  Geddes,  who,  on  Sunday,  July  23, 
1637,  when  the  attempt  was  made  to  establish  the 


440    Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

English  liturgy  by  the  dean  of  Edinburgh,  under 
the  advice  of  Archbishop  Laud,  hurled  her  stool  at 
the  head  of  the  dean  and  raised  a  riot  and  an  out- 
burst of  popular  indignation,  not  confined  to  Edin- 
burgh, which  outburst  forced  the  withdrawal  of 
the  liturgy.  Episcopacy  was  abolished  and  St. 
Giles  became  again  a  parish  church.  On  the  floor 
of  the  Moray  Aisle  is  a  brass  tablet  on  which  is 
inscribed :  "Near  this  spot  a  brave  Scotch  woman, 
Janet  Geddes,  struck  the  first  blow  in  the  great 
struggle  for  freedom  and  conscience." 

At  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century,  more 
parish  churches  being  required,  the  idea  was  adopt- 
ed of  cutting  up  St.  Giles  into  sections  and  utiliz- 
ing each  as  a  parish  church.  The  choir  was  con- 
verted into  the  High  Church,  frequented  by  those 
of  "dignified,  aristocratic  flavor  approaching  some- 
what to  prelacy,  sound  church-and-state  men  who 
did  not  care  so  much  for  the  sermon  as  for  the 
gratification  of  sitting  in  the  same  place  as  his 
majesty's  lords  of  council  and  session  and  the  mag- 
istrates of  Edinburgh."  The  old  church  in  the  cen- 
tre was  frequented  by  "people  who  wished  to  have 
a  sermon  of  good  divinity  about  three-quarters  of 
an  hour  long,  and  who  did  not  care  for  the  darkness 


Edinburgh.  441 

and  dreariness  of  their  temple."  The  Tolbooth 
church  ("taking  its  name  from  the  Tolbooth  or  city 
jail  near  by  was  the  peculiar  resort  of  "rigid  Cal- 
vinists  who  loved  nothing  but  extempore  evangelical 
sermons  and  would  have  considered  it  sufficient  to 
bring  the  house  down  about  their  ears  if  the  pre- 
centor has  ceased  for  one  verse  the  old  hillside 
fashion  of  reciting  the  lines  of  the  psalm  before 
singing  them."  (Traditions  of  Edinburgh).  In 
1829,  a  partial  restoration  was  accomplished,  but 
not  until  1 871  was  the  project  to  effect  the  altera- 
tions which  transformed  the  church  into  its  present 
condition  taken  up,  and  this  was  accomplished,  in 
full,  in  1879.  As  it  stands  to-day,  St.  Giles  is  dear 
to  all  Scotchmen,  recalling  as  it  does  so  much  that 
is  great  and  glorious  in  the  country's  history. 
Within  are  tablets  in  memory  of  three  ministers: 
James  Balfour  (1589-1613),  who  "refused  to  ac- 
cept Episcopacy,"  John  Craig,  the  Ex-Dominican, 
and  Alexander  Henderson,  who  "framed  the  sol- 
emn league  and  covenant,"  sat  in  the  Assembly  of 
Divines  at  Westminster,  and  had  prominent  part 
in  framing  the  Confession  of  Faith,  and  especially 
the  Shorter  Catechism.  Choice  memorial  windows 
have  been  placed  in  position,  ten  of  which  portray 


442     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

scenes  in  the  life  ©f  Christ,  one  representing  the 
assassination  of  the  good  regent  (Moray)  and 
Knox  preaching  his  funeral  sermon.  The  oriel 
contains  the  royal  arms  and  the  incident  of  "David 
I  and  the  Stag."  And  the  great  west  window  has 
for  its  subject  "The  Prophets."  This  display  of 
regimental  colors,  "frayed  with  age  and  discolored 
in  many  a  hard  fought  battle,"  excites  deep  interest. 
St.  Giles  is  still  "the  Soldiers'  Church,"  troopers 
from  the  castle  garrison,  clad  in  Highland  costume, 
attending  the  early  morning  service.  But  then,  and 
throughout  the  Lord's  Day,  the  Gospel  of  peace 
and  love  is  preached. 

Outside   St.   Giles,   in  the   middle  of  the  paved 
street,  upon  a  square  stone,  inscribed: 
J.  K. 

1572. 
is  the  humble  monument  of  him  "who  never  feared 
the  face  of  man." 

There  are  other  old  ecclesiastical  edifices  of  per- 
petual interest  to  denizens  of  Edinburgh  and  to  the 
stranger  within  her  gates.  Among  these,  is  Mag- 
dalene Chapel,  at  the  west  end  of  the  Cowgate, 
founded  in  1503.  In  this  chapel.  John  Craig,  a 
Dominican  monk,  who  had  become  a  Protestant, 


Edinburgh.  443 

and  was  a  colleague  of  Knox,  preached  in  the 
Latin  tongue  in  1560,  having  entirely  forgotten,  or 
at  least  was  unable  to  speak  fluently,  his  native 
language  because  of  long  residence  at  Bologna  and 
Vienna.  The  General  Assembly  of  1578  met  here, 
and,  in  this  chapel,  the  National  Covenant  was  pre- 
pared, to  be  signed  at  a  later  time,  in  Grey  Friars 
Church.  The  chapel  is  now  used  by  the  Edinburgh 
Medical  Mission. 

Grey  Friars  Church  Yard  is  sacred  ground.     It 
occupies  a  site  adjoining  the  Grass  market,  where, 
in  the  awful  days  of  Graham  of  Claverhouse,  whose 
residence  (still  standing  at  the  northwest  corner  of 
the   square)    was   nearby,   so   many   of   the   Cove- 
nanters were  executed,  often  after  a  mere  mockery 
of  a  trial,  or  without  any  at  all.    Here,  on  the  25th 
of    February,    1638,    the    National    Covenant    was 
signed,  within  the  Church  of  Greyfriars   (built  in 
1624).     But  the  signers  were  not  content  to  sign 
it  with  ink.     "The  parchment  was  carried  out  to 
the  open  air,  and  laid  upon  a  flat  gravestone,  sur- 
rounded by  a  moved  and  mighty  multitude."     Said 
Dr.  Guthrie,  in  a  speech  describing  the  scene,  "Ah ! 
there  were  men  in  those  days:  they  were  seen  to 
open  a  vein  in  their  arms  and  fill  their  pens  with 


444     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

blood,  to  mark  how  they  would  shed  that  blood 
when  the  battle  day  came,  and  nobly  did  they  re- 
deem their  pledges."  In  1679,  a  detached  portion 
of  the  churchyard  was  used  as  a  prison,  for  five 
wear}-  months,  for  1,200  Covenanters  taken  after 
Bothwell  Bridge.  Many  distinguished  men  lie  bur- 
ied in  the  churchyard.  The  "Martyrs'  Monument" 
attracts  visitors  from  many  lands  to  visit  the  spot. 
Of  the  18,000  faithful  to  the  covenant  even  unto 
death,  there  were  executed  at  Edinburgh,  as  the 
inscription  recites,  "about  a  hundred  noblemen  and 
gentlemen,  ministers  and  others." 

Wrote  Hugh  Miller,  the  great  geologist,  "How- 
ever deep  the  snow  may  be  in  Greyfriars  church- 
yard, there  is  one  path  where  it  is  always  beaten 
down,  and  that  leads  to  the  monument  of  the  Cove- 
nanters." 

West  Kirk,  or  St.  Cuthbert's,  of  special  interest 
to  recent  visitors  because  of  the  eloquent  sermons 
of  Dr.  Macgregor,  is  very  ancient,  by  many  held  to 
be  the  oldest  church  in  Edinburgh,  rich  and  power- 
ful in  the  reign  of  David  I,  and  representing  the 
Culdee  Church  of  that  day. 

It  was  never  anything  but  a  parish  church,  but 
in    that    capacity    was    influential    in    the    extreme. 


Edinburgh.  445 

Says  a  recent  writer:  "It  is  a  significant  fact,  at 
the  present  day,  that  on  investigating  the  origin  of 
Edinburgh  churches,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  the 
answer  will  be,  "A  quoad  sacra  (ecclesiastical  par- 
ish)  taken  off  St.  Cuthberfs." 

The  present  church  edifice  was  opened  for  wor- 
ship on  July  ii,  1894,  after  extensive  alterations 
had  been  made  in  the  structure  erected  in  1775. 
Many  famous  men  are  buried  in  the  churchyard, 
among  these,  Napier,  the  inventer  of  logarithms, 
and  Thomas  DeOuincy. 

Of  a  multitudinous  number  of  objects  of  interest 
in  Edinburgh,  but  few  could  find  mention  in  this 
short  sketch.  Courts,  closes,  houses  and  sites  of 
historic  events  and  associations  in  old  Edinburg, 
have  been  passed  by.  The  more  modern  buildings 
connected  with  scenes  of  more  recent  times  will 
readily  be  found  by  the  visitor.  He  will  seek  out 
the  university,  the  assembly  halls  and  the  theologi- 
cal schools.  He  will  discover  the  Church  of  St. 
Andrews,  George  Street,  where  the  disruption  of 
1843.  resulting  in  the  formation  of  the  Free  Church 
of  Scotland,  occurred,  on  which  occasion  Dr. 
Welsh,  Moderator  of  the  General  Assembly,  read 
a  dignified  protest  against  the  decision  of  the  law 


446     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

courts  to  the  effect  that  congregations  could  not  be 
permitted  to  choose  their  own  ministers  but  must 
accept  the  appointee  of  the  government,  and,  bow- 
ing to  the  Lord  High  Commissioner,  left  St.  An- 
drew's, followed  by  Dr.  Chalmers  and  400  minis- 
ters. A  procession  was  formed  in  which  were 
found  the  Lord  Provosts  of  Edinburgh  and  Glas- 
gow, the  sheriff  of  Midlothian,  two  principals  of 
universities,  four  theological  professors,  eight  ex- 
moderators  of  the  Church  of  Scotland  and  many 
men  of  learning,  who,  with  following  hundreds, 
slowly  wended  their  way  to  Tanfield  Hall  and  form- 
ally constituted  the  Free  Church  of  Scotland,  as 
distinguished  from  the  Established  Church.  The 
four  hundred  ministers  had  relinquished  their  "liv- 
ings." 

The  New  Edinburgh,  with  its  magnificent  Princes 
street,  "the  noblest  street  in  Europe,"  and  all  its 
imposing  buildings,  the  other  beautiful  streets,  and 
gardens  and  churches,  and  dwellings  will  delight 
and  charm  the  most  exacting  and  critical. 

"To  see  Naples  and  die,"  has  long  been  a  proverb. 
But  one  would  better  hold  on  to  himself,  if  he 
lands  on  the  shore  of  the  southern  sea,  at  least  until 
he  has  seen  the  many  beautiful  cities  which  lie  to 


Edinburgh.  447 

the  north  of  the  Vesuvian  Bay,  and  far  north, 
among  the  splendid  cities  of  the  European  world, 
lies  romantic,  historic,  literary,  ecclesiastical  Edin- 
burgh. 

Marcus  A.  Brownson. 


APPENDIX  I. 

DIASPORA    OR    SCATTERED    CHURCHES 
OF  THE  REFORMED  FAITH. 

In  addition  to  those  mentioned  in  the  body  of 
this  book,  there  are  some  scattered  Reformed 
churches  in  different  parts  of  Europe.  Thus  Scan- 
dinavia, though  almost  entirely  Lutheran,  yet  has 
a  few  congregations.  Denmark  has  a  few  Reform- 
ed church  made  up  of  descendants  from  French 
refugees  as  at  Copenhagen  and  Fredericia.  In 
Sweden  there  is  a  French  Reformed  church  at 
Stockholm,  made  up  of  descendents  of  Huguenots. 

Belgium  has  two  Reformed  denominations.  One 
is  the  old  national  Walloon  church,  numbering 
about  ten  thousand,  composed  of  descendents  of 
the  Walloons  of  the  sixteenth  century.  The  other 
is  the  Evangelical  church  of  Belgium,  a  new  or- 
ganization of  the  nineteenth  century,  which  has 
adopted  the  Belgic  confession.  It  has  about  seven 
thousand  communicants  and  is  aggressive  and 
evangelistic. 

Russia,  though  mainly  Greek  in  religion,  yet  has 
several    million    Lutherans,    especially    in    Finland, 

449 


450     Famous  Places  of  Reformed  Churches. 

and  perhaps  over  fifty  thousand  Reformed,  al- 
though it  is  difficult  to  get  figures  on  account  ot 
recent  changes.  It  was  divided  into  three  groups, 
Polish,  Lithuanian  and  the  central  consistory  at 
Petersburg.  The  Polish  church  in  the  reformation 
became  strong  and  influential,  many  of  the  nobles 
joining  it  and  A'Lasco,  the  Polish  reformer,  or- 
ganized it.  But  Jesuits  came  in  like  a  flood  and 
crushed  out  Protestantism.  It  numbers  now  per- 
haps 7,000  adherents  and  its  most  prominent  church 
is  at  Warsaw.  Had  Poland  become  Reformed  in- 
stead of  Jesuit,  the  words  "Finis  Poloniae"  would 
not  have  been  spoken.  The  Reformed  Church  of 
Lithuania  has  about  14  congregations  and  5,000 
adherents  and  a  Reformed  gymnasium  at  Wilna. 
The  rest  are  under  the  consistory  at  Petersburg. 
Thus  there  is  a  French,  German  and  a  Dutch  Re- 
formed congregation  at  St.  Petersburg,  the  Ger- 
mans having  a  splendid  building  and  being  wealthy. 
At  Moscow  there  is  a  German  Reformed  church. 
At  Odessa,  in  southern  Russia  and  near  it,  there  is 
a  large  German  colony,  with  a  strong  Reformed 
church.  There  used  to  be  large  Reformed  congre- 
gations along  the  Volga,  but  many  of  them  have 
recentlv  emigrated   to  the   Dakotas   in   the  United 


Diaspora  or  Scattered  Churches.  451 

State?,  so  that  it  is  difficult  to  get  at  figures  for 
Russia.  There  is  also  one  branch  of  the  Molokani, 
a  large  Russian  sect  that  is  Presbyterian,  and  there 
are  still  some  Stundists,  a  movement  that  grew  out 
of  the  Reformed  Church  in  Russia. 

Spain  has  a  Presbyterian  church,  but  what  is 
there  called  the  Reformed  church  of  Spain  is  Epis- 
copal. Greece  also  has  a  small  Presbyterian  mis- 
sion. In  addition  to  these  there  are  scattered  all 
over  Europe,  in  the  main  cities,  churches  or  halls 
for  English  worship,  after  the  Presbyterian  and 
Reformed  order,  of  which  we  give  a  list  in  the  next 
appendix. 


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PRINTED  IN  U.S.A. 

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